PR 



RDF 



'EARE 



;?x 



HAMiirr 




PRESENTED BY 



/ 



tbeatb^s jEngUsb Clasgics 
THE TRAGEDY 

OF 

HAMLET 

PRINCE OF DENMARK 

EDITED BY 

E. K. CHAMBERS, BA. 

SOMETIME SCHOLAR OF CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE, OXFORD 
EDITOR OF " MACBETH " 



BOSTON, U. S. A. 

D. C. HEATH & CO., PUBLISHERS 

1895 



Gift 
tdson L. Whitney 

0£c 8, 1938 






GENERAL PREFACE. 



In this edition of Shakespeare an attempt is made to 
present the greater plays of the dramatist in their Hterary 
aspect, and not merely as material for the study of philology 
or grammar. Criticism purely verbal and textual has only 
been included to such an extent as may serve to help the 
student in the appreciation of the essential poetry. Questions 
of date and literary history have been fully dealt with in the 
Introductions, but the larger space has been devoted to the 
interpretative rather than the matter-of-fact order of scholar- 
ship. Aesthetic judgments are never final, but the Editors 
have attempted to suggest points of view from which the 
analysis of dramatic motive and dramatic character may be 
profitably undertaken. In the Notes likewise, while it is 
hoped that all unfamiliar expressions and allusions have been 
adequately explained, yet it has been thought even more 
important to consider the dramatic value of each scene, and 
the part which it plays in relation to the whole. These 
general principles are common to the whole series ; in detail 
each Editor is alone responsible for the play or plays that have 
been intrusted to him . 

Every volume of the series has been provided with a 
Glossary, an Essay upon Metre, and an Index ; and Appen- 
dices have been added upon points of special interest, which 
could not conveniently be treated in the Introduction or the 
Notes. The text is based by the several Editors on that of 
the Globe edition : the only omissions made are those that are 
unavoidable in an edition likely to be used by young students. 

By the systematic arrangement of the introductory matter, 
and by close attention to typographical details, every effort 
has been made to provide an edition that will prove con- 
venient in use. 

Boston, August, 1895. 



CONTENTS. 



Page 

General Preface, iii 

Introduction, 7 

Dramatis Person^e, 26 

The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, - 27 

Notes, 122 

Appendices — 

A. The First Quarto of 1603, 188 

B. The Pre- Shakespearian Hamlet, - - - - 192 

c. ' Fratricide Punished', - - - - - - '94 

D. The ' Travelling' of the Players, - - - - 195 

e. 'Dido, Queen of Carthage', 197 

f. Goethe and Coleridge on Hamlet, - - - - 198 

Essay on Metre, - - - - - ' - 201 

Glossary, - - - ^°7 

Index of Words, 22° 

General Index, - - • ' ^^^ 



INTRODUCTION. 



I. LITERARY HISTORY OF THE PLAY. 

The early history of Hamlet affords one of the most diffi- 
cult problems with which Shakespearian scholarship has to 
deal. Three printed versions of the text have The critical 
come down to us. These present remarkable Problem. 
variations from each other, and one of them in particular, 
the earliest, appears to be fundamentally different from the 
other two. The most probable explanation is that the play 
underwent a process of revision after it was originally written 
and acted. If, then, we could determine the exact relation in 
which the three forms stand to one another, we should learn 
a good deal about Shakespeare's dramatic method as shown 
in the deliberate modification of his first ideas. Unfortu- 
nately this is not so easy. Scholars still disagree hopelessly 
as to the exact nature of the earliest version ; and the whole 
question is complicated by the probable existence of a pre- 
Shakespearian Hamlet^ which may have had a considerable 
.influence upon the later play. So that for the present one 
Tmust be content to bring together the facts, to indicate the 
I conditions of the problem, and to suggest the most likely 
' hypothesis for its solution. 

-. The Registers of the Stationer's Company for The Stationers- 
1602, amongst other entries of books 'allowed Registers. 
to be printed', contain the following; — 

xxvjto Julij 
James Robertes. Entered for his copie vnder the handes 
of master Pasfield and master Waterson warden, A 
booke called ''the Revenge of HAMLETT Prince [(?/"] Den- 
inarke^ as y* was latelie Acted by the Lord Chamberleyne his 
seruantes. . . . . . . . . . vjd. 



8 HAMLET. 

No edition is known to have been published in 1602, but 

in 1603 appeared the perplexing First Quarto (Q i). In the 

^, ^. interval the Lord Chamberlain's players had 

The First '^ -^ 

Quarto of passed under the direct patronage of James the 
1603 (Q i). pii-st, and they are therefore entitled ' his High- 
ness' servants ' upon the title-page, which runs : — 

The I Tragicall Hiftorie of ] Hamlet | Prince of Den- 
marke \ By William Shakefpeare. | As it hath beene 
diverfe times acted by his Highneffe fer- | vants in the 
Cittie of London : as alfo in the two V- | niverfities of 
Cambridge and Oxford, and elfe-where | \yignette\ \ 
At London printed for N. L. and lohn Trundell. | 1603. 

James Roberts' name is not here mentioned; but he may 
have printed the book for the publisher N[icholas] L[ing], 
^, ^ , whose device forms the vignette. At any rate 

The Second , ? . , "^ . _ 

Quarto of 1604 he appears to ]y^w% done this in the case of the 
^^'^'' Second Quarto (Q 2), which was published in 

1604, with the following title-page : — 

THE I Tragicall Hiftorie of | Hamlet, | Prince of De?t- 
marke. j By William Shakefpeare. | Newly imprint- 
ed and enlarged to almoft as much againe as it v»^as, 
according to the true and perfect | Coppie | [ Vignette\ j 
A T LONDON, \ Printed by L R. for N. L. and are to 
be fold at his fhoppe vnder Saint Dunfton's Church in | 
Fleet llreet. 1604. 

The First Quarto stands by itself; the later Quartos follow 

the second ; but an independent text is afforded by the First 

Folio (F i) edition of the collected plays issued 

Folio of 1623 after Shakespeare's death in 1623. Here Hamlet 

^ ^'' is entitled a Tragedy, and no longer a Tragical 

History. In the order of the plays it follows Julius Ccesar 
and Macbeth, and immediately precedes King Lear. 

The modern text of Hamlet is based upon a combination 
of the Second Quarto and the First Folio, and it is therefore 
necessary briefly to compare the two with each other, and 
both with the First Quarto. 

The editors of the First Folio claim to have provided care- 



INTRODUCTION. 9 

fully corrected texts of all plays whereof ' stolen and surrepti- 
tious copies' had been in circulation before. To Comparison of 
a certain extent this is justified as to Hatnlet. Q 2 and F i. 
The Second Quarto is very ill printed; it is disfigured by 
obvious mistakes and confusions;^ the punctuation is chaotic. 
The First Folio is not faultless in these respects, but it is a 
great improvement. Many of the errors of the Quarto have 
been avoided, and the minor details of presswork, the 
commas and colons, have been carefully attended to. More- 
over the Folio adds a few passages which are not found in 
the Quarto.^ But these advantages are more than compen- 
sated for by considerable and important omissions, espe- 
cially in the soliloquies.^ The Second Quarto was evidently 
printed from a longer and mpre qomplete manuscript than 
the Folio, and where divergencies of reading occur, and the 
compositor is not in fault, it s^enerally provides the better 
sense.*, 

The relation of the First Quarto to the later versions is a 
much more difficult matter. Most critics are agreed that, 
whatever may have been the case with the character of 
Second Quarto, the First, like the First Quarto Q ^• 
of Ro7iieo and Juliet^ was fairly to be put down by the editors 
of the 1623 folio as a 'stolen and surreptitious copy'. The 
publication of it was doubtless due rather to the enterprise 
of a piratical bookseller than to the wish of Shakespeare 
or his company. And in all probability it was founded upon 
hasty notes, taken in shorthand or otherwise, by some agent 
of this bookseller's during a performance at the theatre. 
This would account for the extreme shortness of the text, for 
its mutilated character, for the obvious gaps in the sense, 

1 See notes on i. 3. 74, 76; i. 4. 36; i. 5. 56; ii. 2. 73; iii. 2. 373 ; iii. 4. 169; 
iv. 7. 22; V. 2. 283, &c. 

2 See notes to ii. 2. 215, 244, 335, 352; iii. 2. 277; iv. 2. 32; iv. 5. 161; v. i. 37, 
115; v. 2. 68; together with Appendix D and Mr. Furnivall's introduction to 
Griggs' facsimile of Q 2. 

3 See notes to i. 1. 108; i. 2, 58; i. 4. 18, 75; iii. 4.«i68; iv. 4. 9; iv. 7. 69; v. 2. 203. 

4 See notes to i. i. 65, 163; i. 2. 129, 248; ii. i. 39; ii. 2. 52, 442, 580; iv. 5. 145; 
v. I. 255, 269, &c. Sometimes F i substitutes a less archaic or unusual word for 
that in Q 2 ; now and then it may contain a finishing touch [e.g. inumed for 
interred in i. 4. 49). 



lo HAMLET. 

for the number of imperfect and wrongly arranged lines, and 
of misheard words and phrases. Some scholars have held 
that the note-taker's materials were pieced out, either from a 
sight of the prompter's copy or the actors' parts, or by the 
pen of a hack poet. But if this had been the case to any 
considerable extent, the defects would hardly have been so 
glaring as they are. I do not think that more has been done 
than just to transcribe the careless and incomplete notes, 
and perhaps here and there to fill up a line by the addition of 
a few words. In any case the printed copy is very far from 
reproducing the dialogue of the play as it was presented upon 
the stage. 

But now comes the point which is still the subject of the 
keenest controversy. Supposing that this dialogue had been 
The question reproduced with absolute accuracy, would the 
of revision. result have closely resembled the Second Quarto 1 
In other words, was the play as acted when the note-taker 
went to the theatre practically identical with the play as 
acted and printed in 1604; or did it undergo alteration and 
revision in the interval? Scholars of great authority have 
declared on both sides, but the weight of evidence appears to 
me to be in favour of the theory that there was a considerable! 
and important revision. The order of the scenes in the First] 
Quarto is not quite that of the second. Some of the char- 
acters, notably that of Gertrude, are differently conceived; 
the great soliloquies are almost entirely omitted ; the dialogue 
is less subtle and elaborate, as might well be the case in a 
first sketch. There are passages which make very good 
sense and not bad poetry as they stand, where there is no 
sign that the reporter has gone far wrong, but which have 
apparently been rewritten and improved throughout for the 
Second Quarto. And finally, the names of the characters are 
not quite the same in the two versions : the Polonius and 
Reynaldo of the Second Quarto replace the Corambis and 
Montano of the First.* In all probability, then, the FirstC 
Quarto is an exceedingly corrupt text of a first sketch of^ j 
Hamlet ; the Second Quarto represents much more accurately ^r 
a revised form of the same play. 



INTRODUCTION. n 

It has been asked — Was this first sketch of Hamlet Shake- 
speare's thi oughout, or did it contain parts by an earlier writer, 
which in the revision Shakespeare cut out and ^^^ 
replaced by his own work? One cannot suppose Shakespearian 
Shakespeare's masterpiece of tragedy to have 
been written in the sixteenth century; but there certainly 
was a play of Hamlet in existence as early as 1 589 or possibly 
1587. There are several allusions to this play in contem- 
porary Hterature,! notably in Nash's prefatory epistle to 
Greene's Menaphon. And in the diary of Henslowe the 
manager there is a record of a performance of it, not as a 
'new enterlude', on June 9, 1594. It was acted by the Lord 
Chamberlain's company, who were then playing for about 
ten days under Henslowe's management at Newington Butts. 
It has been suggested with some plausibility that this early 
Hamlet was written by Thomas Kyd, author of The Spanish 
Tragedy. In any case, seeing that it had come into the 
hands of the Lord Chamberlain's company by 1594, there 
can be little doubt that Shakespeare used it as a starting- 
point, when he wrote his own play on the same subject for 
the same company. Probably he kept the framework of the 
plot, including the ghost, the play withm a play, and the 
somewhat bloodthirsty final scene. Shakespeare was never 
careful to invent his own plots ; his art lay rather in using 
old bottles to contain his quite new wine. But the dialogue, 
the characters, the psychological motive — these are his and 
his alone, and it is in these that the greatness of Hamlet lies. 
The only question is whether this process of adaptation was 
complete in the first sketch, or whether fragments of the 
earlier author's writing are still embedded in the text. The 
Clarendon Press editors adopt the second alternative. They 
believe that the First Quarto represents Shakespeare's re- 
modelling of an old play " after it had been retouched by 
him to a certain extent, but before his alterations were com- 
plete", and they go on to say: " In the earlier form it appears 
to us that Shakespeare's modification of the play had not 
gone much beyond the second act ". I am obliged to dissent 

1 For early allusions to the pre-Shakespearian Hamlet see Appendix B. 



12 HAMLET. 

entirely from this theory. It ascribes a great deal too much 
to the older writer. Tentative as the First Quarto is, it still 
contains the essential outlines of the perfected play; and if 
the bulk of it is not Shakespeare's, then there was another 
Elizabethan dramatist as great as Shakespeare himself, who 
has left no other sign of his existence. If there are any traces 
of the older play left in the first sketch, I am pretty sure they] 
are very slight, and I rather think they are retained in the] 
revised version also. 

There is another source from which it has been suggested 
that we may perhaps get some idea of what the pre-Shake- 
The German spearian Ha^nUt was like. This is the German 
^Fratricide version, knowu as Der bestrafte Bruderynord, or 
Punished. Fratricide Punished. The existing text dates 
only from 1710, but in the opinion of some scholars it is a 
degenerate form of a play, written not later than 1 589.^1 
Several companies of English actors visited Germany at the 
end of the sixteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth 
centuries, and there is a record of a performance of Hamlet 
a Prince in Dennemarck by 'the English actors' at the 
court of Dresden in 1626. It is not at all unlikely that the 
MS. of an early Hamlet., by Kyd or another, was carried by 
Leicester's players to Denmark in 1585, and thence to Saxony 
in 1586, Or it may have been written, appropriately enough, 
for performance in Denmark. Three of these players. Will 
(Kempe?), George Bryan, and Thomas Pope, had joined the 
Chamberlain's (then Lord Strange's) company by 1 593, and 
thus the play would have come into Shakespeare's hands. 
Fratricide Punished is very short — a mere dramatic sketch ; 
but it contains the outlines of Hamlet., without the Shake-* 
spearian psychology or the Shakespearian style. These aref 
replaced by coarse humour and a good deal of bathos and 
commonplace. Something of this may be due to German 
influences; but on the whole the difference is just what one 
would expect to find between a popular drama of 1585 and a 
Shakespearian drama based upon it. Some of the dramatis 
personce bear other names than those in Hamlet., and it is 

1 See Appendix C. 



INTRODUCTION. 13 

noteworthy that Polonius is represented by Corambus. It 
must be remembered, however, that the German play cannot 
be proved to date from the sixteenth century. The MS. 
belongs to the eighteenth, and the resemblances to Hamlet 
may be due to the fact that the author was simply adapting 
a copy of the First Quarto which had drifted to Germany. 

Hamlet^ then, is probably based upon an older play of the 
ci*ude ' revenge ' type. To what dates are we to ascribe the 
various stages of Shakespeare's treatment of the ^, 

^ . , . - . , , ine question 

theme? The revised version may fairly be put of Date, 1601- 
at about 1603-4, between the date of the publi- ^^°^' 
cation of the Second Quarto and the visit of the surreptitious 
note-taker to the theatre. The first sketch cannot be later 
than the entry in the Stationers' Registers for 26th July, 1602. f 

/'"And it cannot well be earlier than 1 598, as it is not mentioned! 

\ in the list of Shakespeare's plays given by Francis Meres in 
\his Palladis Tamia of that year. Internal evidence appears 
to fix 1 60 1 as the most likely date. We know from the title- 
page of the First Quarto that it was acted when Shakespeare 
and his fellows were touring in the provinces; and this being 
so, we may fairly find in what is said about the players in 
act ii. sc. 2 an allusion to the fortunes of the Chamberlain's 
company. Two reasons are there given for the 'travelling^ 
of the actors; one, an 'inhibition', due to a 'late innovation'; 
the other, the popularity of a rival company, an 'eyrie of 
children', who had 'be-rattled the common stages'.^ No 
other year fits these references so well as 1601. The Cham- 
berlain's company were ' inhibited ' from giving their custom- 
ary court performances at the Christmas of that year, on 
account of their connection with Essex's attempt at political 
'innovation'. We know that they 'travelled', for they are 
found at Aberdeen in October, and there are also traces of a 
possible visit to Cambridge at about this time. In 1601, 
moreover, Jonson's satirical plays, in which he attacked most 
of the rival dramatists, were being produced by the Chapel 
children at Blackfriars. This sufficiently explains the allusion 
to the 'eyrie of children'. It is also worth noting that at 

1 On these allusions see Appendix D. 



14 HAMLET. 

this period William Kempe, the famous actor of clowns, was 
not a member of the Chamberlain's company. He left them 
in 1599, and probably returned in 1602. This explains why 
the hit at him in iii. 2. 41 is so much more elaborate in the 
first than in the Second Quarto.^ There is yet one more con- 
sideration which points to this date of 1601. It brings the 
play into close connection with Julius CcEsar and Macbeth^ 
both of which belong to just this period, the period of the 
earliest tragedies. And it is noteworthy that the same 
dramatic motive is used in all three plays — the contrast,! 
namely, between the active and the speculative tempera-l 
ment.^ \ 

I may sum up this discussion by a brief sketch of what I 
conceive to have taken place. I may add that for this I 
am largely indebted to the suggestive work of ) 

Summary. ° ■' ^ , . , _ , 

Mr. rleay. I thmk, then, that ever smce 1594 
the Chamberlain's company had possessed the manuscript of 
the old ' revenge ' play of Hamlet. While they were on tour 
in 1601, Shakespeare used this as a basis for a hasty drama on 
the same subject. When they returned to London in 1602 
they continued to perform this, and it was pirated by James 
Roberts. In the meantime, however, Shakespeare had 
revised his work, and the new version was put upon the stage 
in 1603. Then Roberts or Ling came to terms with the com- 
pany, and was allowed to publish a second and authorized 
edition from the poet's manuscript. Thus the Second Quarto 
represents the completest form of the drama, as performed 
in 1604. But it nearly always happens that when a play has 
been on the boards some little time, it requires 'cutting' 
and altering in detail for stage purposes. It was so with 
Hamlet. In particular, some of the soliloquies proved too 
long. And in the same way, a few new passages were from 
time to time introduced. These alterations would naturally 
be inserted in the stage-copy, and from this stage-copy the 
First Folio was printed in 1623. A good deal of this sketch 
is merely hypothesis, but at least it is an hypothesis which 

1 See note ad loc. 

2 Cf. Professor Dowden, Shakspere: his MindandArt; preface to Third Edition. 



INTRODUCTION. 15 

gives an intelligible theory of the relation between the various 
versions. 

The distinction between the Quarto and Folio text was 
maintained throughout the seventeenth century. The Folios 
of 1632 (F 2), 1664 (F 3), and 1685 (F 4) all repro- ^^^ ^^^^^ 
duce in the main the text of 1623. Quarto Folios and 
editions were published during the poet's lifetime Qu^''*o^- 
in 1605 (Q 3) and 161 1 (Q 4). The date of Q 5, which follows 
Q 4, is unknown. Then come the Quarto of 1637 (Q 6), and 
what are called the Players' Quartos of 1676, 1683, and 1703. 
All of these follow the Second Quarto, with certain emenda- 
tions of their own. 

The first actor of the part of Hamlet was doubtless Richard 
Burbage. A record of his performance is pre- -pj^^ Actors of 
served in an elegy upon his death, written Hamlet. 
perhaps in 1619.^ The lines run as follows: — 

' ' He 's gone, and with him what a world are dead 
[Which he reviv'd, to be revived so 
No more : young Hamlet, old Hieronimo, 
Kind Leir, the grieved Moor, and more beside, 
That liv'd in him, have now for ever died.] 
Oft have I seen him leap into the grave, 
Suiting the person, that he seem'd to have, 
Of a sad lover, with so true an eye, 
That there I would have sworn he meant to die. 
Oft have I seen him play this part in jest. 
So lively, that spectators and the rest 
Of his sad crew, while he but seemed to bleed, 
Amazed thought ev'n then he died indeed." 

Burbage was succeeded by Joseph Taylor, and from Taylor 
the tradition of the part was handed down to Thomas Better- 
ton, the famous actor of the Restoration. 

2. SOURCE OF THE PLOT. 

Hamlet first appears in the Historia Danica of Saxo Gram- 
maticus. This chronicler lived at the end of the twelfth 

1 On the various versions of this Elegy, and their authenticity, see Ingleby, 
Shakespere: the Man and the Book, Part II. The four bracketed lines are pro- 
bably spurious. 



i6 HAMLET. 

century, and his work was first printed at Paris in 15 14. The 
story of Hamlet or Amlethus is contained in the third and 
fourth books, under the reign of King Roricus. Grytha, the 
daughter of Roricus, was Hamlet's mother. From Saxo the 
story passed into European literature. Hans Sachs wrote a 
doggerel German version of it in 1558 ; and in 1570 it was in- 
cluded in the fifth volume of Francis de Belleforest's Histoires 
Tragiques^ a collection in which the history of Romeo and 
Juliet is also found. The French version may have come 
under Shakespeare's notice, and an English translation of the 
Historic of Hamblet is in existence. But the only known 
edition of this was printed for Thomas Pavier in 1608. And 
though there may have been earlier issues, it is noticeable, as 
Elze has pointed out, that the translation diverges from the 
French original in one or two places, and that in these the 
influence of the play is plainly apparent. In any case only 
the outlines of Shakespeare's plot are to be found in the 
novel. " The murder of Hamlet's father ", says Mr. Furness, 
"the marriage of his mother with the murderer, Hamlet's 
pretended madness, his interview with his mother, and his 
voyage to England, are nearly the only points in common." 
With the exception of Amleth and Geruth, the very names 
are different. In all probability Shakespeare only had before 
him the earlier play on the subject already referred to. 

Numerous attempts have been made to identify the char- 
acters of the play with actual men and women of the Eliza- 
bethan age. One critic holds that Hamlet is throughout a 
satire on the famous essayist Michel de Montaigne. Another 
believes that the whole tragedy is a veiled picture of the 
relations between Mary Queen of Scots, Darnley, Bothwell, 
and James the First. Yet other theorists interpret Hamlet 
as Sir Philip Sidney; Polonius, Laertes, and Ophelia as 
Lord Burleigh, Robert and Anne Cecil, Claudius as Sir 
Nicholas Bacon, Horatio as Hubert Languet; Marcellus, 
Bernardo, and Lamond as Fulke Greville, Edward Dyer, and 
Sir Walter Raleigh. The want of definite evidence for these 
conjectures makes it unnecessary to discuss them at length. 
They are suggestive to the imagination rather than to the 

( 885 ) 



INTRODUCTION. ' 17 

reason, and from the imaginative point of view I have 
ventured to say a word on one of them at the close of this 
Introduction. 



3. CRITICAL APPRECIATION. 

The criticism of Hamlet is apt to centre round the ques- 
tion, 'Was Hamlet mad?' The problem is not merely 
insoluble; it cannot even be propounded in an 

11- M 1 • T^ 1 1 1 • • 1 The alleged 

mtelligible guise. Psychology knows no rigid madness of 
dividing line between the sane and the insane, ^^'"l^'^- 
The pathologist, indeed, may distinguish certain abnormal 
conditions of brain-areas, and call them diseased ; or the 
lawyer may apply practical tests to determine the point 
where restraint of the individual liberty becomes necessary 
in the public interest. But beyond this you cannot go ; you 
cannot, from any wider point of view, lay your finger upon 
one element here or there in the infinite variety of human 
character and say, ' That way madness lies'. Of this, how- 
ever, we may be sure. Shakespeare did not mean Hamlet 
to be . mad in any sense which would put his actions in a 
quite different category from those of other men. That 
would have been to divest his work of humanity and leave it 
meaningless. For the tragedy of HaiJilet does not lie in the 
fact that it begins with a murder and ends with a massacre ; 
it is something deeper, more spiritual than that. The essential 
The most tragic, the most affecting thing in ^""agedy. 
the world is the ruin of a high soul. This is the theme of 
Hamlet; it is a tragedy of failure, of a great nature confronted 
with a low environment, and so, by the perversity of things, 
made ineffective and disastrous through its own greatness. 
Keeping, then, this central idea in mind, let us attempt an 
analysis of the play in which it is set forth. 

Hamlet is presented to us as a man of sensitive tempera- 
ment and high intellectual gifts. He is no ordinary prince ; 
his spirit has been touched to finer issues ; his wit is keen- 
edged and dipped in irony ; his delicacy of moral insight is 
unusual among the ruder Danes. He is no longer in his 
(885) B 



i8 HAMLET. 

first youth when the play opens, but up to that moment his 

hfe has been serene and undisturbed. His 

piay.^'The'*'^ father's unexpected death has called him back 

character of from the University of Wittenberg-, where his 

Hamlet. . , , , . , °' ,. 

time has been spejnt m an atmosphere of studious 
calm and philosophic speculation. His tastes are those of 
the scholar; he loves to read for hours together, and, like 
most literary men, he takes great delight in the stage, with 
whose theory and practice he is familiar. He is no recluse; 
he has the genius for friendship and for love ; when at 
Elsinore he has been conspicuous in the gallant exercises of 
the age. He is the darling of the court and beloved by the 
people. But his real interest is all in speculation, in the play 
of mind around a subject, in the contemplation of it on all 
sides and from every point of view. Such a training has not 
fitted him to act a kingly part in stirring times ; the intellec- 
tual element in him has come to outweigh the practical ; the 
vivid consciousness of many possible courses of conduct 
deters him from the strenuous pursuit of one ; so that he has 
lost the power of deliberate purposeful action, and, by a 
strange paradox, if this thoughtful man acts at all, it must be 
from impulse. 

Quite suddenly the dreamer finds himself face to face with 
a thing to be done. According to the ethics of the day it 

becomes his imperative duty to revenge his 
tion : a call for father's murder ; a difficult task, and one whose 
^^^^°^- success might well seem doubtful. But Hamlet 

does not shrink at first from recognizing the obligation ; it 
is 'cursed spite' that the burden of setting the world 
straight should have fallen upon him, but he will not refuse 
to shoulder it. Only the habits of a lifetime are not to be 
thrown off so easily. As the excitement of the ghost's reve- 
lation passes away, the laws of character begin to reassert 
themselves. The necessity of ' thinking it over' is potent 
with Hamlet. Instead of revealing all to his friends and 
enlisting their assistance, he binds them to secrecy and forms 
the plan of pretending madness that he may gain time to 
consider his position. Let us consider it with him. 



INTRODUCTION. 19 

In the first place, he is absolutely alone. The court at 
Elsinore is filled with quite ordinary people, none of whom 
can understand him, to none of whom he can The court of 
look for help. This note of contrast between Elsinore. 
Hamlet and his surroundings is struck again and again. 
They are of another world than his, limited, commonplace, 
incapable of ideals. His motives and feelings, his scruples 
and hesitations, are hopelessly beyond their comprehension. 
And therefore — this is the irony of it — most of them are far 
more fitted to deal with a practical crisis in life than this 
high-strung idealist of a prince. There are ' the good king 
and queen ' ; Claudius, shrewd and ready for an emergency, 
one who has set foot in the paths of villany and will not 
turn back, for all the dim visitings of momentary remorse; 
Gertrude, a slave to the stronger nature, living m the present, j 
unable to realize her own moral degradation. There is 
Horatio, a straightforward upright soldier, one whom Hamlet 
intensely respects, comes even to envy, but who is not subtle 
enough to be of much use to him. There is Polonius, a 
played-out state official, vain and slow-witted, pattering 
words of wisdom which he does not understand and cannot 
put into practice. There are his son and daughter, Laertes 
and Ophelia : Laertes, a shallow vigorous young noble, quick 
with a word, and quick with a blow, but demoralized by the 
esprit Gaulois ; Ophelia, a timid conventional girl, too fragile 
a reed for a man to lean upon. Hamlet loves her, anc bhe 
loves Hamlet, but it is not a love that will bear him through 
the deep waters of affliction. The rest of the court are typi- 
fied by Osric the waterfly, and by Guildenstern and Rosen- 
crantz, of whom if you say Rosencrantz and Guildenstern it 
makes no difference ; echoes, nonentities. With Hamlet on 
one side and these on the other, the elements of a tragedy 
are complete ; the problem can work out to no satisfactory 
conclusion. 

Once Hamlet has shrunk from immediate action, the 
possibilities of delay exercise an irresistible fas- xhe course of 
cination over him. The ingenuity of his intellect ^^ tragedy. 
exhausts itself in the discovery of obstacles ; he takes every 



20 HAMLET. 

turn and twist to avoid the fatal necessity for action. At 
first he turns to Ophelia, the well-beloved. She will give 
him strength to accomplish his mission ; but the scene in her 
closet, and still more the lie which she tells when her father 
is behind the arras, confess her weakness and compel him to 
renunciation. In the meantime he continues the assumption 
of madness. It serves a double purpose : he is free from the 
intolerable burden of keeping on good terms with Claudius 
and the rest; he can fight out the battle with himself in 
peace, while he mocks them with the ironies congenial to his 
mood. And what is more, he can let himself go ; the strain 
of his overwrought mind relieves itself in bursts of an 
extravagance only half affected. He plays the madman to 
prevent himself from becoming one. But all the while he is 
no nearer the end. He has turned the whole matter over 
and cannot decide. His thoughts slip away from the plain 
issue and lose themselves in a bitter criticism of all created 
things. In this the speculative temper infallibly betrays 
itself; the interest of the universal, not of the particular, is 
always dominant with Hamlet ; not his mother's sin, but the 
frailty of women, is his natural theme. And so it is with a 
pang that he constantly recalls himself to the insistent actual 
life, from the world in which he is a past-master to that 
wherein he gropes ineffectively. Of course he is fully aware 
of his own weakness; a deficiency of self-analysis is not 
likt-ly to be one of his failings; but this does not give 
him power to throw it off, nor help him from his maze of 
recurring dilemmas. More than once he is on the point of 
cutting the knot by death, but even for that he has not the 
resolution. 

At last the crisis comes. Hamlet has resolved that the 
play-scene shall decide once for all the question of the king's 
guilt. That guilt is made most manifest, and 
the opportunity for revenge is offered him. He 
does not take it. Covering his weakness with unreal reasons, 
he passes into the queen's chamber. After that it is too late. 
The impetuous murder of Polonius is the first link in a chain 
of calamities. Moreover it gives Claudius his chance. The 



INTRODUCTION. 21 

king has never been wholly deceived by Hamlet's madness ; 
he is sent to England, and only escapes that trap to fall into 
another. True, in the end the king dies by one impulsive 
stroke; but that cannot repair the ruin which Hamlet's want 
of purpose has caused. The infinitely sad fate of Ophelia ; 
the deaths of Polonius, Laertes, Gertrude, Rosencrantz, Guil- 
den stern; for all their faults, all these are a sacrifice on the 
altar of his infirmity. Only for Hamlet himself was the fatal 
blow ' a consummation devoutly to be wished '. 

The ineffectiveness of the speculative intellect in a world 
of action, that is the key-note of the play. In Hamlet, as 
in Brutus, the idealist gets the worst of it, and The contrast 
we are left to wonder at the irony of things ^^ H^"^'^^- 
by which it is so. And just as the figure of Brutus is set 
between the two triumphant PhiUstines, Caesar and Antony, 
so Shakespeare is careful to provide a similar contrast for 
Hamlet. Partly this is to be found in Horatio and Laertes, 
but still more in the Norwegian, Fortinbras. The very exis- 
tence of Fortinbras and the danger with which he threatens 
the state show the need for an iron hand in Denmark; 
Hamlet's reflections on his meeting with the Norwegian 
soldiers emphasizes the same point, and the final appearance 
of Fortinbras and his selection by Hamlet as the true 
saviour of society is fully significant. It is the lesson of 
Henry V., the lesson of the ' still strong man in a blatant 
land'. Only in Hamlet it is the other side that is apparent ; 
not the pohtical principle, but the human tragedy, the ruin of 
the great soul because it is not strong, practical. 

It would be an interesting task to estimate how far the 
genius of Shakespeare has been impaired for a modern reader 
by the change in sentiments which the lapse of The modernity 
three crowded centuries has brought about. An of Hamlet. 
Elizabethan dramatist could appeal with confidence to sym- 
pathies which are evanescent, to-day. T/ie Merchant oj 
Venice, for instance, in spite of all its beauty and all its wit, 
yet bears an air of unreality to us, because its leading motive, 
that of \\\&Judenhetze, no longer finds an echo outside the 
hmits of Whitechapel. Probably Mr. Irving's histrionic 



22 HAMLET. 

instinct was right when it led him to convert a villain into a 
hero, and to present the play as an apology for toleration, 
though this was an idea foreign to Shakespeare and im- 
possible on the boards of the Theatre. It is remarkable, how- 
ever, that there is one tragedy at least in which the normal 
law is reversed, and which is more vivid, more intelligible 
to us than it could have been to our Elizabethan ancestors. 
Modern civilization has indeed discarded the ethics of the 
vendetta \ the moral sentiment which holds revenge for a 
father's murder to be a binding duty upon the son no longer 
appears obvious and natural. An effort of the historic imagi- 
nation is required to grasp its importance as a leading idea 
in the drama of Hamlet. But with the dominant figure, with 
Hamlet himself, it is otherwise. A prolonged study of the 
character leaves one with the startling sense that out of the 
plenitude of his genius Shakespeare has here depicted a type 
of humanity which belongs essentially not to his age but to 
our own. There was, we know, an older Hamlet^ a popular 
revenge-play, pulsating, no doubt, like Titus Atidroniciis^ 
with blood and fire. Into the midst of such a story the poet 
has deliberately set this modern born out of due time, this 
high-strung dreamer, who moves through it to such tragic 
issues. The key-note of Hamlet's nature is the over-cultiva- 
tion of the mind. He is the academic man, the philosopher 
brought suddenly into the world of strenuous action. The 
fatal habit of speculation, fatal at Elsinore, however proper 
and desirable at Wittenberg, is his undoing. Cursed with the 

' ' craven scruple 
Of thinking too precisely on the event ", 

he is predestined to practical failure, failure from which no 
delicacy of moral fibre, no truth and intensity of feeling, can 
save him. It is surely no mere accident that so many 
features in the portrait of Hamlet are reproduced in Mrs. 
Ward's Edward Langham. The worship of intellect, the ab- 
sorbing interest in music and the theatre, the nervous excita- 
bility, the consciousness of ineffectiveness taking refuge in 



INTRODUCTION. 23 

irony and sarcasm, these and countless other points stamp 
them as temperaments of kindred mould. And in both lives 
the tragic woof is the same ; it is the tragedy of spiritual im- 
potence, of deadened energies and paralysed will, the essential 
tragedy of modernity. Hamlet fascinates us, just as Langham 
fascinates us, because we see in him ourselves ; we are all 
actual or potential Hamlets. 

Was Shakespeare, then, a prophet, or how came he to hit 
upon a conception so alien to the 'form and pressure' of the 
time.'* One thinks of Elizabethan England as sir Philip 
vigorous and ardent, flushed with youth and Sidney. 
hope, little vexed with intellectual subtleties. Laertes is its 
type, not Hamlet. Perhaps the Sonnets^ with the personal 
insight they give us into the poet's temper, help to solve the 
problem. Shakespeare was not Hamlet, but he touched him 
on many sides. The maker, like the puppet, had his moments 
of world-weariness, and breathed his sigh for 'restful death'. 
But there is another than Shakespeare himself m whom we 
would willingly recognize in some measure the original of 
Hamlet. It is not needful to commit ourself to the growing 
modern theory that the dramas of Shakespeare, comedies and 
tragedies alike, are largely Aristophanic in their intent, filled 
with topical sketches and allusions, to which in many cases 
the clue is now lost. But it is difficult not to think it probable 
that in this particular the poet gathered some hints from the 
noticeable personality of Sir Philip Sidney. Sidney is curi- 
ously lacking in the characteristic Elizabethan blitheness ; he 
looks by preference on the gloomy side of things ; the pessi- 
mistic note comes out no less in his letters than in the bitter 
mockery of the famous dirge. And, like Hamlet, he was a 
scholar and an idealist, set in an uncongenial environment 
and always striving ineffectually to escape from it into the life 
of action. The lingering and futility of his later years were 
due in great measure to the force of external circumstance, 
yet something in them may also be traced, clearly enough, to 
Hamlet's irresolution and impotence of will. Nor can one 
fail to be struck by the parallel between the language common 



24 HAMLET. 

to the wits and poets of Elizabeth's court in speaking of ' the 
president of noblesse and of chivalry' and the lament of 
Ophelia over the unstrung nerves of her lover :—- 

" Oh, what a noble mind is here o'erthrown ! 
The courtier's, soldier's, scholar's, eye, tongue, sword, 
The expectancy and rose of the fair state, 
The glass of fashion and the mould of form, 
The observed of all observers, quite, quite down !" 

E. K. a 

Nov. gth, iSgs. 



HAMLET, 

PRINCE OF DENMARK. 



> courtiers. 



DRAMATIS PERSONS. 

Claudius, king of Denmark. 

Hamlet, son to the late, and nephew to the present king. 

PoLONius, lord chamberlain. 

Horatio, friend to Hamlet. 

Laertes, son to Polonius. 

voltimand, 

Cornelius, 

rosencrantz, 

Guildenstern, 

OSRIC, 

A Gentleman, 

A Priest. ^ 

Marcellus, ■! 

- officers. 
Bern are c, ; 

Francisco, a soldier. 

Reynaldo, servant to Polonius 

Players. 

Two clowns, grave-diggers. 

FoRTiNBRAS, prince of Norway. 

A Captain. 

English Ambassadors. 

Gertrude, queen of Denmark, and mother to Hamlet. 
Ophelia, daughter to Polonius. 

Lords, Ladies, Officers, Soldiers, Sailors, Messengers, and other Attendants. 
Ghost of Hamlet's Father. 

Scene: Denmark. 



HAMLET, 

PRINCE OF DENMARK. 



ACT I. 

Scene I. Elsinore. A platform before the castle. 
Francisco at his post. Enter to him Bernardo. 

Ber. Who's there? 

Fran. Nay, answer me: stand, and unfold yourself. 

Ber. Long live the king ! 

Fran. Bernardo? 

Ber. He. 

Fran. You come most carefully upon your hour. 

Ber. 'Tis now struck twelve; get thee to bed, Francisco 

Fran. For this rehef much thanks: 'tis bitter cold, 
And I am sick at heart. 

Ber. Have you had quiet guard? 

Fran. Not a mouse stirring. lo 

Ber. V/ell, good night. 
If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus, 
The rivals of my watch, bid them make haste. 

Fran. I think I hear them. Stand, ho! Who's there? 

Enter HoRATio and Marcellus. 

Hor. Friends to this ground. 

j{far. And liegemen to the Dane. 

Fraji. Give you good night. 

Mar. O, farewell, honest soldier: 

Who hath relieved you? 

Fran. Bernardo has my place. 

Give you good night. [Exit. 

Mar. Holla! Bernardo! 

Ber. Say, 

What, is Horatio there? 

Hor. A piece of him. 

Ber. Welcome, Horatio: welcome, good Marcellus. 20 



28 HAMLET. [Act I. 

Hor. What, has this thing appear'd again to-night? 

Ber. I have seen nothing. 

Mar. Horatio says 't is but our fantasy, 
And will not let belief take hold of him 
Touching this dreaded sight, twice seen of us: 
Therefore I have entreated him along 
With us to watch the minutes of this night; 
That if again this apparition come. 
He may approve our eyes and speak to it. 

Hor. Tush, tush, 't will not appear. 

Ber. Sit down awhile; 30 

And let us once again assail your ears, 
That are so fortified against our story 
What we have two nights seen. 

Hor. Well, sit we down, 

And let us hear Bernardo speak of this. 

Ber. Last night of all. 
When yond same star that 's westward from the pole 
Had made his course to illume that part of heaven 
Where now it burns, Marcellus and myself, 
The bell then beating one, — 

Enter Ghost. 

Mar. Peace, break thee off; look, where it comes again ! 

Ber. In the same figure, like the king that's dead. 41 

Mar. Thou art a scholar; speak to it, Horatio. 

Ber. Looks it not Hke the king? mark it, Horatio. 

Hor. Most like: it harrows me with fear and wonder. 

Ber. It would be spoke to. 

Mar. Question it, Horatio. 

Hor. What art thou that usurp'st this time of night. 
Together with that fair and warlike form 
In which the majesty of buried Denmark 
Did sometimes march? by heaven I charge thee, speak! 

Mar. It is offended. 

Ber. , See, it stalks away ! 50 

Hor. Stay ! speak, speak ! I charge thee, speak ! 

l^Exit Ghost. 

Mar. 'T is gone, and will not answer. 

Ber. How now, Horatio! you tremble and look pale: 
Is not this something more than fantasy? 
What think you on 't ? 

Hor. Before my God, I might not this believe 
Without the sensible and true avouch 
Of mine own eyes. 



Scene i.] HAMLET. 29 

Mar. Is it not like the king? 

Hor. As thou art to thyself: 
Such was the very armour he had on 60 

When he the ambitious Norway combated; 
So frown'd he once, when, in an angry parle, 
He smote the sledded pole-axe on the ice. 
'T is strange. 

Mar. Thus twice before, and jump at this dead hour. 
With martial stalk hath he gone by our watch. 

Hor. In what particular thought to work I know not; 
But in the gross and scope of my opinion, 
This bodes some strange eruption to our state. 

Mar. Good now, sit down, and tell me, he that knows, 70 
Why this same strict and most observant watch 
So nightly toils the subject of the land. 
And why such daily cast of brazen cannon, 
And foreign mart for implements of war; 
Why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore task 
Does not divide the Sunday from the week; 
What might be toward, that this sweaty haste 
Doth make the night joint-labourer with the day: 
Who is't that can inform me? 

Hor. That can I; 

At least, the whisper goes so. Our last king, 80 

Whose image even but now appear'd to us, 
Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway, 
Thereto prick'd on by a most emulate pride. 
Dared to the combat; in which our valiant Hamlet — 
For so this side of our known world esteem'd him — 
Did slay this Fortinbras; who, by a seal'd compact. 
Well ratified by law and heraldry, 
Did forfeit, with his life, all those his lands 
Which he stood seized of, to the conqueror: 
Against the which, a moiety competent 90 

Was gaged by our king; which had return'd 
To the inheritance of Fortinbras, 
Had he been vanquisher; as, by the same covenant. 
And carriage of the article design'd. 
His fell to Hamlet. Now, sir, young Fortinbras, 
Of unapproved mettle hot and full, 
Hath in the skirts of Norway here and there 
Shark'd up a list of lawless resolutes. 
For food and diet, to some enterprise 

That hath a stomach in't; which is no other— 100 

As it doth well appear unto our state — 



30 HAMLET. [Act I. 

But to recover of us, by strong hand 

And terms compulsatory, those foresaid lands 

So by his father lost: and this, I take it, 

Is the main motive of our preparations, 

The source of this our watch and the chief head 

Of this post-haste and romage in the land. 

Ber. 1 think it be no other but e'en so: 
Well may it sort that this portentous figure 
Comes armed through our watch; so like the king i lo 

That was and is the question of these wars. 

Hor. A mote it is to trouble the mind's eye. 
In the most high and palmy state of Rome, 
A little ere the mightiest Julius fell. 
The graves stood tenantless and the sheeted dead 
Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets: 
As stars with trains of fire and dews of blood, 
Disasters in the sun; and the moist star 
Upon whose influence Neptune's empire stands 
Was sick almost to doomsday with eclipse: I20 

And even the like precurse of fierce events, 
As harbingers preceding still the fates 
And prologue to the omen coming on, 
Have heaven and earth together demonstrated 
Unto our climatures and countrymen. — 
But soft, behold ! lo, where it comes again ! 

Re-enter Ghost. 

I '11 cross it, though it blast me. Stay, illusion ! 

If thou hast any sound, or use of voice, \It spreads its arms. 

Speak to me: 

If there be any good thing to be done, 130 

That may to thee do ease and grace to me, 

Speak to me : 

If thou art privy to thy country's fate. 

Which, happily,, foreknowing may avoid, 

O, speak! 

Or if thou hast uphoarded in thy life 

Extorted treasure in the womb of earth. 

For which, they say, you spirits oft walk in death, 

\The cock crows. 
Speak of it: stay, and speak! Stop it, Marcellus. 

Mar. Shall I strike at it with my partisan? 140 

Hor. Do, if it will not stand. 

Ber. 'T is here ! 

Hor. 'Tis here! 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 31 

]\Iar. 'T is gone ! \Exit Ghost. 

We do it wrong, being so majestical, 
To offer it the show of violence; 
For it is, as the air, invulnerable. 
And our vain blows malicious mockery. 

Ber. It was about to speak, when the cock crew. 

Hor. And then it started like a guilty thing 
Upon a fearful summons. I have heard, 
The cock, that is the trumpet to the morn, 1 50 

Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throat 
Awake the god of day; and, at his warning, 
Whether in sea or fire, in earth or air, 
The extravagant and erring spirit hies 
To his confine: and of the truth herein 
This present object made probation. 

Mar. It faded on the crowing of the cock. 
Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes 
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated. 
The bird of dawning singeth all night long: 160 

And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad; 
The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike. 
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm, 
So hallow'd and so gracious is the time. 

Hor. So have I heard and do in part believe it. 
But, look, the morn, in russet mantle clad, 
Walks o'er the dew of yon high eastward hill : 
Break we our watch up ; and by my advice, 
Let us impart what we have seen to-night 
Unto young Hamlet; for, upon my life, 170 

This spirit, dumb to us, will speak to him. 
Do you consent we shall acquaint him with it. 
As needful in our loves, fitting our duty? 

Mar. Let's do't, I pray; and I this morning know 
Where we shall find him most conveniently. \Exeunt. 

Scene II. A roo7n of state in the castle. 

Enter Claudius King of Denmark, Gertrude the Queen, 
Hamlet, Polonius, Laertes and his sister Ophelia, 
Lords Attendant. 

King. Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's death 
The memory be green, and that it us befitted 
To bear our hearts in grief and our whole kingdom 
To be contracted in one brow of woe, 



32 HAMLET. [Act I. 

Yet so far hath discretion fought with nature 

That we with wisest sorrow think on him, 

Together with remembrance of ourselves. 

Therefore our sometime sister, now our queen, 

The imperial jointress to this warlike state, 

Have we, as 't were with a defeated joy, — lo 

With an auspicious and a dropping eye, 

With mirth in funeral and with dirge in marriage, 

In equal scale weighing delight and dole, — 

Taken to wife: nor have we herein barr'd 

Your better wisdoms, which have freely gone 

With this affair along. For all, our thanks. 

Now follows, that you know, young Fortinbras, 

Holding a weak supposal of our worth. 

Or thinking by our late dear brother's death 

Our state to be disjoint and out of frame, 20 

Colleagued with the dream of his advantage. 

He hath not fail'd to pester us with message, 

Importing the surrender of those lands 

Lost by his father, with all bonds of law, 

To our most valiant brother. So much for him. 

Now for ourself and for this time of meeting: 

Thus much the business is: we have here writ 

To Norway, uncle of young Fortinbras, — 

Who, impotent and bed-rid, scarcely hears 

Of this his nephew's purpose, — to suppress 30 

His further gait herein; in that the levies, 

The lists and full proportions, are all made 

Out of his subject : and we here dispatch 

You, good Cornelius, and you, Voltimand, 

For bearers of this greeting to old Norway; 

Giving to you no further personal power 

To business with the king, more than the scope 

Of these delated articles allow. 

Farewell, and let your haste commend your duty. 

-rr 7 \ In that and all things will we show our duty. 40 

King, We doubt it nothing: heartily farewell. 

{Exeunt Voltimand and Cornelius. 
And now, Laertes, what's the news with you? 
You told us of some suit ; what is 't, Laertes ? 
You cannot speak of reason to the Dane, 
And lose your voice: what wouldst thou beg, Laertes, 
That shall not be my offer, not thy asking? 
The head is not more native to the heart. 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 33 

The hand more instrumental to the mouth, 
Than is the throne of Denmark to thy father. 
What wouldst thou have, Laertes? 

Laer. ^ My dread lord, 50 

Your leave and favour to return to France; 
From whence though willingly I came to Denmark, 
To show my duty in your coronation, 
Yet now, I must confess, that duty done. 
My thoughts and wishes bend again toward France 
And bow them to your gracious leave and pardon. 

King. Have you your father's leave? What says Polonius? 

Pol. He hath, my lord, wrung from me my slow leave 
By laboursome petition, and at last 

Upon his will I seal'd my hard consent: 60 

I do beseech you, give him leave to go. 

Kmg. Take thy fair hour, Laertes; time be thine. 
And thy best graces spend it at thy will ! 
But now, my cousin Hamlet, and my son, — 

Ham. [Aside] A little more than kin, and less than kind. 

Kmg. How is it that the clouds still hang on you? 

I/a?n. Not so, my lord; I am too much i' the sun. 

Queen. Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted colour off, 
And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark. 
Do not for ever with thy vailed lids 70 

Seek for thy noble father in the dust: 
Thou know'st 't is common; all that lives must die, 
Passing through nature to eternity. 

Ham. Ay, madam, it is common. 

Queen. If it be. 

Why seems it so particular with thee? 

Hain. Seems, madam ! nay, it is; I know not 'seems'. 
'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother. 
Nor customary suits of solemn black. 
Nor windy suspiration of forced breath, 

No, nor the fruitful river in the eye, 80 

Nor the dejected 'haviour of the visage. 
Together with all forms, moods, shows of grief, 
That can denote me truly: these indeed seem. 
For they are actions that a man might play: 
But I have that within which passeth show; 
These but the trappings and the suits of woe. 

King. 'T is sweet and commendable in your nature, Hamlet, 
To give these mourning duties to your father: 
But, you must know, your father lost a father; 
That father lost, lost his, and the survivor bound 90 

(S85) C 



34 HAMLET. [Act I. 

In filial obligation for some term 

To do obsequious sorrow: but to perse ver 

In obstinate condolement is a course 

Of impious stubbornness; 'tis unmanly grief; 

It shows a will most incorrect to heaven, 

A heart unfortified, a mind impatient, 

An understanding simple and unschool'd: 

For what we know must be and is as common 

As any the most vulgar thing to sense, 

Why should we in our peevish opposition lOO 

Take it to heart? Fie ! 't is a fault to heaven, 

A fault against the dead, a fault to nature, 

To reason most absurd; whose common theme 

Is death of fathers, and who still hath cried. 

From the first corse till he that died to-day, 

' This must be so'. We pray you, throw to earth 

This unprevailing woe, and think of us 

As of a father: for let the world take note. 

You are the most immediate to our throne; 

And with no less nobility of love no 

Than that which dearest father bears his son, 

Do I impart toward you. For your intent 

In going back to school in Wittenberg, 

It is most retrograde to our desire: 

And we beseech you, bend you to remain 

Here, in the cheer and comfort of our eye, 

Our chiefest courtier, c-ousin, and our son. 

Queen, Let not thy mother lose her prayers, Hamlet 
I pray thee, stay with us ; go not to Wittenberg. 

Ham. I shall in all my best obey you, madam. 120 

Ki7ig. Why, 'tis a loving" and a fair reply: 
Be as ourself in Denmark. Madani, come; 
This gentle and unforced accord of Hamlet 
Sits smiling to my heart : in grace whereof. 
No jocund health that Denmark drinks to-day. 
But the great cannon to the clouds shall tell. 
And the king's rouse the heavens shall bruit again. 
Re-speaking earthly thunder. Come away. 

\Exeu7it all but Hamlet. 

Ham. O, that this too too solid flesh would melt. 
Thaw and resolve itself into a dew ! 130 

Or that the Everlasting had not fix'd 
His canon 'gainst self-slaughter ! O God ! God ! 
How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable. 
Seem to me all the uses of this world ! 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 35 

Fie on 't ! ah fie ! 't is an unweeded garden, 

That grows to seed ; things rank and gross in nature 

Possess it merely. That it should come to this ! 

But two months dead: nay, not so much, not two: 

So excellent a king; that was, to this, 

Hyperion to a satyr; so loving to my mother 140 

That he might not beteem the winds of heaven 

Visit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth ! 

Must I remember? why, she would hang on him. 

As if increase of appetite had grown 

By what it fed on: and yet, within a month — 

Let me not think on 't — Frailty, thy name is woman ! — 

A little month, or ere those shoes were old 

With which she follow'd my poor father's body, 

Like Niobe, all tears : — why she, even she — 

O God ! a beast, that wants discourse of reason, 1 50 

Would have mourn'd longer — married with my uncle, 

My father's brother, but no more like my father 

Than I to Hercules: within a month: 

Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears 

Had left the flushing in her galled eyes, 

She married. O, most wicked speed, to post 

With such dexterity to incestuous sheets! 

It is not nor it cannot come to good : 

But break, my heart ; for I must hold my tongue, 

Enter Horatio, Marcellus, and Bernardo. 

Hor. Hail to your lordship ! 

Ham. I am glad to see you well : 

Horatio, — or I do forget myself. 161 

Hor. The same, my lord, and your poor servant ever. 

Ha7n. Sir, my good friend ; I '11 change that name with you : 
And what make you from Wittenberg, Horatio? Marcellus? 

Mar. My good lord — 

Ham. I am very glad to see you. Good even, sir. 
But what, in faith, make you from Wittenberg? 

Hor. A truant disposition, good my lord. 

Ham. I would not hear your enemy say so, 170 

Nor shall you do mine ear that violence. 
To make it truster of your own report 
Against yourself: I know you are no truant. 
But what is your affair in Elsinore? 
We '11 teach you to drink deep ere you depart. 

Hor. My lord, I came to see your father's funeral. 

Hain. I pray thee, do not mock me, fellow-student ; 



36 HAMLET. [Act I. 

I think it was to see my mother's wedding. 

Hor. Indeed, my lord, it follow'd hard upon. 

Ham. Thrift, thrift, Horatio! the funeral baked meats i8o 
Did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables. 
Would I had met my dearest foe in heaven 
Or ever I had seen that day, Horatio ! 
My father ! — methinks I see my father. 

Hor. Where, my lord? 

Ham. In my mind's eye, Horatio. 

Hor. I saw him — once; he was a goodly king. 

Ham. He was a man, take him for all in all, 
I shall not look upon his like again. 

Hor. My lord, I think I saw him yesternight. 

Ha7n. Saw? who? 190 

Hor. My lord, the king your father. 

Ham. The king my father ! 

Hor. Season your admiration for a while 
With an attent ear, till I may deliver. 
Upon the witness of these gentlemen. 
This marvel to you. 

Ham. For God's love, let me hear. 

Hor. Two nights together had these gentlemen, 
Marcellus and Bernardo, on their watch. 
In the dead waste and middle of the night. 
Been thus encounter'd. A figure like your father. 
Armed at point exactly, cap-a-pe, 200 

Appears before them, and with solemn march 
Goes slow and stately by them: thrice he walk'd 
By their oppress'd and fear-surprised eyes, 
Within his truncheon's length ; whilst they, distill'd 
Almost to jelly with the act of fear, 
Stand dumb and speak not to him. This to me 
In dreadful secrecy impart they did ; 
And I with them the third night kept the watch : 
Where, as they had deliver'd, both in time, 
Form of the thing, each word made true and good, 210 

The apparition comes: I knew your father; 
These hands are not more like. 

Ham. But where was this? 

Mar. My lord, upon the platform where we watch'd. 

Ham. Did you not speak to it? 

Hor. My lord, I did ; 

But answer made it none : yet once methought 
It lifted up it head and did address 
Itself to motion, like as it would speak ; 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 37 

But even then the morning cock crew loud, 

And at the sound it shrunk in haste away, 

And vanish'd from our sight. 

Ham. 'T is very strange. 220 

Hor. As I do live, my honour'd lord, 't is true ; 

And we did think it writ down in our duty 

To let you know of it. 
Ham. Indeed, indeed, sirs, but this troubles me. 

Hold you the watch to-night? 

^^^- I We do, my lord. 

Ham. Arm'd, say you? 

Ham. From top to toe? 

^^^^' \ My lord, from head to foot. 

Ham. Then saw you not his face? 

Hor. Oh, yes, my lord ; he wore his beaver up. 230 

Ham. What, look'd he frowningly? 

Hor. A countenance more in sorrow than in anger. 

Ham. Pale or red? 

Hor. Nay, very pale. 

Ham. And fix'd his eyes upon you? 

Hor. Most constantly. 

Hain. I would I had been there. 

Hor. It would have much amazed you. 

Ham. Very like, very like. Stay'd it long? 

Hor. While one with moderate haste might tell a hundred. 

Mar. \ T 1 

Ber. \ Longer, longer. 

Hor. Not when I saw't. 

Ham. His beard was grizzled, — no? 240 

Hor. It was, as I have seen it in his life, 
A sable silver'd. 

Ham. I will watch to-night ; 

Perchance 't will walk again. 

Hor. I warrant it will. 

Ham. If it assume my noble father's person, 
I '11 speak to it, though hell itself should gape 
And bid me hold my peace. I pray you all. 
If you have hitherto conceal'd this sight. 
Let it be tenable in your silence still ; 
And whatsoever else shall hap to-night. 
Give it an understanding, but no tongue : 250 



38 HAMLET. [Act I. 

I will requite your loves. So, fare you well : 
Upon the platform, 'twixt eleven and twelve, 
I '11 visit you. 

All. Our duty to your honour. 

Ham. Your loves, as mine to you : farewell. 

\Exeu7it all but Hamlet. 
My father's spirit in arms ! all is not well; 
I doubt some foul play : would the night were come ! 
Till then sit still, my soul : foul deeds will rise. 
Though all the earth o'erwhelm them, to men's eyes. \_Exit. 

Scene III. A room iri Polojtius' house. 
E7iter Laertes aiid Ophelia. 

Laer. My necessaries are embark'd : farewell : 
And, sister, as the winds give benefit 
And convoy is assistant, do not sleep. 
But let me hear from you. 

Oph. Do you doubt that? 

Laer. For Hamlet and the trifling of his favour, 
Hold it a fashion and a toy in blood, 
A violet in the youth of primy nature. 
Forward, not permanent, sweet, not lasting, 
The perfume and suppliance of a minute; 
No more. 

Oph. No more but so? 

Laer. Think it no more : lo 

For nature, crescent, does not grow alone 
In thews and bulk, but, as this temple waxes, 
The inward service of the mind and soul 
Grows wide withal. Perhaps he loves you now, 
And now no soil nor cautel doth besmirch 
The virtue of his will : but you must fear. 
His greatness weigh'd, his will is not his own ; 
For he himself is subject to his birth : 
He may not, as unvalued persons do, 

Carve for himself; for on his choice depends 20 

The safety and health of this whole state ; 
And therefore must his choice be circumscribed 
Unto the voice and yielding of that body 
Whereof he is the head. Then if he says he loves you. 
It fits your wisdom so far to believe it 
As he in his particular act and place 
May give his saying deed; which is no further 



Scenes.] HAMLET. 39 

Than the main voice of Denmark goes withal. 

Then weigh what loss your honour may sustain, 

If with too credent ear you list his songs, 30 

Or lose your heart, or your chaste treasure open 

To his unmaster'd importunity. 

Fear it, Ophelia, fear it, my dear sister, 

And keep you in the rear of your affection, 

Out of the shot and danger of desire. 

The chariest maid is prodigal enough. 

If she unmask her beauty to the moon: 

Virtue itself 'scapes not calumnious strokes: 

The canker galls the infants of the spring. 

Too oft before their buttons be disclosed, 40 

And in the morn and liquid dew of youth 

Contagious blastments are most imminent. 

Be wary then; best safety lies in fear: 

Youth to itself rebels, though none else near. 

Oph. I shall the effect of this good lesson keep, 
As watchman to my heart. But, good my brother, 
Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, 
Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven; 
Whiles, like a puff 'd and reckless libertine, 
Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads, 50 

And recks not his own rede. 

Laer. O, fear me not. 

I stay too long: but here my father comes. 

Enter POLONIUS. 

A double blessing is a double grace; 
Occasion smiles upon a second leave. 

Pol. Yet here, Laertes ! aboard, aboard, for shame ! 
The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail. 
And you are stay'd for. There; my blessing with thee! 

nd these few precepts in thy memory 
See thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue, 
Nor any unproportion'd thought his act. 60 

Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar. 
Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, 
Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel; 
But do not dull thy palm with entertainment 
Of each new-hatch'd, unfledged comrade. Beware 
Of entrance to a quarrel, but being in. 
Bear 't that the opposed may beware of thee. 
Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice; 
Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgement. 



40 HAMLET. [Act I. 

Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, 70 

But not express'd in fancy; rich, not gaudy; 

For the apparel oft proclaims the man, 

And they in France of the best rank and station 

Are of a most select and generous choice in that. 

Neither a borrower nor a lender be; 

For loan oft loses both itself and friend, 

And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry. 

This above all: to thine own self be true. 

And it must follow, as the night the day, 

Thou canst not then be false to any man. 80 

Farewell: my blessing season this in thee! 

Laer. Most humbly do I take my leave, my lord. 

Pol. The time invites you; go; your servants tend. 

Laer. Farewell, Ophelia; and remember well 
What I have said to you. 

Oph. 'T is in my memory lock'd, 

And you yourself shall keep the key of it. 

Laer. Farewell. \Exit. 

Pol. What is't, Ophelia, he hath said to you? 

Oph. So please you, something touching the Lord Hamlet. 

Pol. Marry, well bethought : 90 

'T is told me, he hath very oft of late 
Given private time to you; and you yourself 
Have of your audience been most free and bounteous: 
If it be so, as so 't is put on me, 
And that in way of caution, I must tell you. 
You do not understand yourself so clearly 
As it behoves my daughter and your honour. 
What is between you? give me up the truth. 

Oph. He hath, my lord, of late made many tenders 
Of his affection to me. 100 

Pol. Affection ! pooh ! you speak like a green girl. 
Unsifted in such perilous circumstance. 
Do you believe his tenders, as you call them? 

Oph. I do not know, my lord, what I should think. 

Pol. Marry, I'll teach you: think yourself a baby; 
That you have ta'en these tenders for true pay. 
Which are not sterling. Tender yourself more dearly; 
Or — not to crack the wind of the poor phrase, 
Running it thus — you '11 tender me a fool. 

Oph. My lord, he hath importuned me with love 1 10 

In honourable fashion. 

Pol. Ay, fashion you may call it; go to, go to. 

Oph. And hath given countenance to his speech, my lord. 



Scene 4.] HAMLET. 41 

With almost all the holy vows of heaven. 

Pol. Ay, springes to catch woodcocks. I do know, 
When the blood burns, how prodigal the soul 
Lends the tongue vows: these blazes, daughter. 
Giving more light than heat, extinct in both, 
Even in their promise, as it is a-making. 
You must not take for fire. From this time 120 

Be somewhat scanter of your maiden presence; 
Set your entreatments at a higher rate 
Than a command to parley. For Lord Hamlet, 
Believe so much in him, that he is young. 
And with a larger tether may he walk 
Than may be given you: in few, Ophelia, 
Do not believe his vows ; for they are brokers, 
Not of that dye which their investments show, 
But mere implorators of unholy suits, 

Breathing like sanctified and pious bonds, 130 

The better to beguile. This is for all: 
I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth, 
Have you so slander any moment leisure. 
As to give words or talk with the Lord Hamlet. 
Look to 't, I charge you : come your ways. 

Oph. I shall obey, my lord. [Exeunt. 

Scene IV. The platform. 
Enter Hamlet, Horatio, a7id Marcellus. 

Ham. The air bites shrewdly; it is very cold. 

Hor. It is a nipping and an eager air. 

Ham. What hour now? 

Hor. ' I think it lacks of twelve. 

Mar. No, it is struck. 

Hor. Indeed? I heard it not: then it draws near the 
season 
Wherein the spirit held his wont to walk. 

\A flourish of trumpets., and ord7tance shot off., within. 
What does this mean, my lord? 

Ham. The king doth wake to-night and takes his rouse. 
Keeps wassail, and the swaggering up-spring reels ; 
And, as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down, 10 

The kettle-drum and trumpet thus bray out 
The triumph of his pledge. 

Hor. Is it a custom? 

Ha??i. Ay, marry, is't: 



42 HAMLET. [Act I. 

But to my mind, though I am native here 

And to the manner born, it is a custom 

More honour'd in the breach than the observance. 

This heavy-headed revel east and west 

Makes us traduced and tax'd of other nations: 

They clepe us drunkards, and with swinish phrase 

Soil our addition ; and indeed it takes 20 

From our achievements, though perform'd at height, 

The pith and marrow of our attribute. 

So, oft it chances in particular men. 

That for some vicious mole of nature in them. 

As, in their birth— wherein they are not guilty, 

Since nature cannot choose his origin — 

By the o'ergrowth of some complexion. 

Oft breaking down the pales and forts of reason. 

Or by some habit that too much o'er-leavens 

The form of plausive manners, that these men, 30 

Carrying, I say, the stamp of one defect, 

Being nature's livery, or fortune's star, — 

Their virtues else — be they as pure as grace. 

As infinite as man may undergo — 

Shall in the general censure take corruption 

From that particular fault : the dram of eale 

Doth all the noble substance of a doubt 

To his own scandal. 

Ho7\ Look, my lord, it comes ! 

Enter Ghost. 

Ham. Angels and ministers of grace defend us! 
Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damn'd, 40 

Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from hell, 
Be thy intents wicked or charitable. 
Thou comest in such a questionable shape 
That I will speak to thee : I '11 call thee Hamlet, 
King, father, royal Dane : O, answer me ! 
Let me not burst in ignorance ; but tell 
Why thy canonized bones, hearsed in death. 
Have burst their cerements ; why the sepulchre. 
Wherein we saw thee quietly inurn'd. 

Hath oped his ponderous and marble jaws, 50 

To cast thee up again. What may this mean. 
That thou, dead corse, again in complete steel 
Revisit'st thus the glimpses of the moon, 
Making night hideous ; and we fools of nature 
So horridly to shake our disposition 



Scene 4.] HAMLET. 43 

With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls? 
Say, why is this? wherefore? what should we do? 

{Ghost becko7is Hamlet. 

Hor. It beckons you to go away with it, 
As if it some impartment did desire 
To you alone. 

Mar. Look, with what courteous action 60 

It waves you to a more removed ground : 
But do not go with it. 

Ho?'. No, by no means. 

Ham. It will not speak; then I will follow it. 

Hor. Do not, my lord. « 

Ham. Why, what should be the fear? 

I do not set my life at a pin's fee; 
And for my soul, what can it do to that. 
Being a thing immortal as itself? 
It waves me forth again: I '11 follow it. 

Hor. What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord, 
Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff 70 

That beetles o'er his base into the sea, 
And there assume some other horrible form. 
Which might deprive your sovereignty of reason 
And draw you into madness? think of it: 
The very place puts toys of desperation, 
Without more motive, into every brain 
That looks so many fathoms to the sea 
And hears it roar beneath. 

Ham. It waves me still. 

Go on; I '11 follow thee. 

Mar. You shall not go, my lord. 

Ham. Hold off your hands. 80 

Hor. Be ruled; you shall not go. 

Ham. My fate cries out, 

And makes each petty artery in this body 
As hardy as the Nemean lion's nerve. 
Still am I call'd. Unhand me, gentlemen. 
By heaven, I '11 make a ghost of him that lets me ; 
I say, away ! Go on ; I '11 follow thee. 

\Exeu7it Ghost and Hamlet. 

Hor. He waxes desperate with imagination. 

Mar. Let's follow; 'tis not fit thus to obey him. 

Hor. Have after. To what issue will this come? 

Mar. Something is rotten in the state of Denmark. 90 

Hor. Heaven will direct it. 

Mar. Nay, let 's follow him. \Exeimt. 



44 HAMLET. [Act I. 

Scene V. Another part of the platform. 
Enter Ghost a7td Hamlet. 

Ham. Where wilt thou lead me? speak; I '11 go no further. 

Ghost. Mark me. 

Hajn. I will. 

Ghost. My hour is almost come, 

When I to sulphurous and tormenting flames 
Must render up myself. 

Ham. Alas, poor ghost ! 

Ghost. Pity me not, tut lend thy serious hearing 
To what I shall unfold. 

Ham. Speak; I am bound to hear. 

Ghost. So art thou to revenge, when thou shalt hear. 

Ham. What? 

Ghost. I am thy father's spirit, 
Doom'd for a certain term to walk the night, lo 

And for the day confined to fast in fires, 
Till the foul crimes done in my days of nature 
Are burnt and purged away. But that I am forbid 
To tell the secrets of my prison-house, 
I could a tale unfold whose lightest word 
Would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood, 
Make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their spheres. 
Thy knotted and combined locks to part 
And each particular hair to stand an end, 
Like quills upon the fretful porpentine : 20 

But this eternal blazon must not be 
To ears of flesh and blood. List, list, O, list ! 
If thou didst ever thy dear father love — 

Hajn. O God ! 

Ghost. Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder. 

Ham. Murder! 

Ghost. Murder most foul, as in the best it is; 
But this most foul, strange and unnatural. 

Ham. Haste me to know't, that I, with wings as swift 
As meditation or the thoughts of love, 3° 

May sweep to my revenge. 

Ghost. I find thee apt; 

And duller shouldst thou be than the fat weed 
That roots itself in ease on Lethe wharf, 
Wouldst thou not stir in this. Now, Hamlet, hear: 
'T is given out that, sleeping in my orchard, 
A serpent stung me; so the whole ear of Denmark 



\ 



Scene 5.] HAMLET. 45 

Is by a forged process of my death 
Rankly abused: but know, thou noble youth, 
The serpent that did sting thy father's Hfe 
Now wears his crown. 

Ham. O my prophetic soul ! 40 

My uncle ! 

Ghost. Ay, that incestuous, that adulterate beast, 
With witchcraft of his wit, with traitorous gifts, — 
O wicked wits and gifts, that have the power 
So to seduce ! — won to his shameful lust 
The will of my most seeming-virtuous queen: 

Hamlet, what a falling-ofif was there! 
From me, whose love was of that dignity 
That it went hand in hand even with the vow 

1 made to her in marriage, and to decline 50 
Upon a wretch whose natural gifts were poor 

To those of mine ! 

But virtue, as it never will be moved, 

Though lewdness court it in a shape of heaven, 

So lust, though to a radiant angel link'd. 

Will sate itself in a celestial bed. 

And prey on garbage. 

But, soft! methinks I scent the morning air; 

Brief let me be. Sleeping within my orchard, 

My custom always of the afternoon, 60 

Upon my secure hour thy uncle stole, 

With juice of cursed Hebona in a vial. 

And in the porches of my ears did pour 

The leperous distilment; whose effect 

Holds such an enmity with blood of man 

That swift as quicksilver it courses through 

The natural gates and alleys of the body. 

And with a sudden vigour it doth posset 

And curd, like eager droppings into milk. 

The thin and wholesome blood: so did it mine; 70 

And a most instant tetter bark'd about. 

Most lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust, 

All my smooth body. 

Thus was I, sleeping, by a brother's hand 

Of life, of crown, of queen, at once dispatch'd: 

Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin, 

Unhousel'd, disappointed, unaneled. 

No reckoning made, but sent to my account 

With all my imperfections on my head: 

O, horrible ! O, horrible ! m^ost horrible ! 80 



46 HAMLET. [Act L 

If thou hast nature in thee, bear it not; 

Let not the royal bed of Denmark be 

A couch for luxury and damned incest. 

But, howsoever thou pursuest this act, 

Taint not thy mind, nor let thy soul contrive 

Against thy mother aught: leave her to heaven 

And to those thorns that in her bosom lodge, 

To prick and sting her. Fare thee well at once ! 

The glow-worm shows the matin to be near. 

And 'gins to pale his unefifectual fire : 90 

Adieu, adieu ! Hamlet, remember me. \Exit. 

Ham. O all you host of heaven ! O earth ! what else ? 
And shall I couple hell? O, fie ! Hold, hold, my heart ; 
And you, my sinews, grow not instant old, 
But bear me stiffly up. Remember thee ! 
Ay, thou poor ghost, while memory holds a seat 
In this distracted globe. Remember thee ! 
Yea, from the table of my memory 
I '11 wipe away all trivial fond records, 

All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past, 100 

That youth and observation copied there; 
And thy commandment all alone shall live 
Within the book and volume of my brain, 
Unmix'd with baser matter: yes, by heaven ! 
O most pernicious woman ! 

villain, villain, smiling, damned villain ! 
My tables, — meet it is I set it down,. 

That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain; 
At least I 'm sure it may be so in Denmark: {^Writing. 

So, uncle, there you are. Now to my word ; 1 10 

It is 'Adieu, adieu! remember me'. 

1 have sworn 't. 

rj''^' V {^Within'] My lord, my lord,— 

'Within] Lord Hamlet, 



Within] Heaven secure him ' 



Mar. 

Hor. 

Hain. So be it ! 

Hor. [ Withifz] Hillo, ho, ho, my lord ! 

Ham. Hillo, ho, ho, boy ! come, bird, come. 

Enter HoRATio and Marcellus. 

Mar. How is't, my noble lord? 

Hor. What news, my lord? 

Ham. O5 wonderful ! 

Hor. Good my lord, tell it. 



Scene 5.] HAMLET. 47 

Ham. No ; you '11 reveal it. 
Hor. Not I, my lord, by heaven. 

Mar. Nor I, my lord. 120 

Ham. How say you, then ; would heart of man once think 
it? 
But you'll be secret? 

^^- [ Ay, by heaven, my lord. 

Ham. There's ne'er a villain dwelling in all Denmark 
But he 's an arrant knave. 

Hor. There needs no ghost, my lord, come from the grave 
To tell us this. 

Ham. Why, right ; you are i' the right ; 

And so, without more circumstance at all, 
I hold it fit that we shake hands and part : 
You, as your business and desire shall point you ; 
For every man has business and desire, 130 

Such as it is; and for mine own poor part. 
Look you, I '11 go pray. 

Hor. These are but wild and whirling words, my lord. 

Ham. I 'm sorry they offend you, heartily ; 
Yes, 'faith, heartily ; 

Hor. There 's no offence, my lord. 

Ham. Yes, by Saint Patrick, but there is, Horatio, 
And much offence too. Touching this vision here. 
It is an honest ghost, that let me tell you: 
For your desire to know what is between us, 
O'ermaster 't as you may. And now, good friends, 140 

As you are friends, scholars and soldiers. 
Give me one poor request. 

Hor. What is't, my lord? we will. 

Ham. Never make known what you have seen to-night. 

^^^_ I My lord, we will not. 

Hmn. Nay, but swear 't. 

}{Qr, In faith. 

My lord, not L 

Mar. Nor I, my lord, in faith. 

Ham. Upon my sword. 

Mar. We have sworn, my lord, already. 

Ham. Indeed, upon my sword, indeed. 

Ghost. [Beneath^ Swear. 

Ha7?i. Ah, ha, boy! say'st thou so? art thou there, true- 
penny? ^50 
Come on — you hear this fellow in the cellarage — 



48 HAMLET. [Act I. 

Consent to swear. 

Hor. Propose the oath, my lord. 

Ham. Never to speak of this that you have seen, 
Swear by my sword. 

Ghost. \BeneatJi\ Swear. 

Ham. Hie et ubique? then we '11 shift our ground. 
Come hither, gentlemen. 
And lay your hands again upon my sword : 
Never to speak of this that you have heard, 
Swear by my sword. i6o 

Ghost. [Beneath'] Swear. 

Ham. Well said, old mole! canst work i' the earth so fast? 
A worthy pioner! Once more remove, good friends. 

Hor. O day and night, but this is wondrous strange ! 

Ham. And therefore as a stranger give it welcome. 
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, 
Than are dreamt of in our philosophy. 
But come; 

Here, as before, never, so help you mercy, 
How strange or odd soe'er I bear myself, , 170 

As I perchance hereafter shall think meet 
To put an antic disposition on. 
That you, at such times see'ng me, never shall, 
With arms encumber'd thus, or this head-shake. 
Or by pronouncing of some doubtful phrase. 
As ' Well, well, we know', or ' We could, an if we would', 
Or ' if we list to speak', or ' There be, an if they might'. 
Or such ambiguous giving out, to note 
That you know aught of me : this not to do. 
So grace and mercy at your most need help you, 180 

Swear. 

Ghost. \Beneat}f\ Swear. , 

Ham. Rest, rest, perturbed spirit ! \They swear.] So, 
gentlemen. 
With all my love I do commend me to you : 
And what so poor a man as Hamlet is 
May do, to express his love and friending to you, 
God willing, shall not lack. Let us go in together : 
And still your fingers on your lips, I pray. 
The time is out of joint : O cursed spite. 
That ever I was born to set it right ! 190 

Nay, come, let 's go together. [Exeunt. 



Act II. Scene i.] HAMLET. 49 

ACT II. 

Scene I. A room in Polo Jims' house. 
Enter Polonius and Reynaldo. 

Pol. Give him this money and these notes, Reynaldo. 

Rey. I will, my lord. 

Pol. You shall do marvellous wisely, good Reynaldo, 
Before you visit him, to make inquire 
Of his behaviour. 

Rey. My lord, I did intend it. 

Pol. Marry, well said ; very well said. Look you, sir, 
Inquire me first what Danskers are in Paris ; 
And how, and who, what means, and where they keep. 
What company, at what expense ; and finding 
By this encompassment and drift of question 10 

That they do know my son, come you more nearer 
Than your particular demands will touch it. 
Take you, as 't were, some distant knowledge of him ; 
As thus, ' I know his father and his friends. 
And in part him' : do you mark this, Reynaldo? 

Rey. Ay, very well, my lord. 

Pol. ' And in part him ; but ' you may say ' not well : 
But, if 't be he I mean, he 's very wild ; 
Addicted so and so' : and there put on him 
What forgeries you please ; marry, none so rank 20 

As may dishonour him ; take heed of that ; 
But, sir, such wanton, wild and usual slips 
As are companions noted and most known 
To youth and liberty. 

Rey. As gaming, my lord. 

Pol. Ay, or drinking, fencing, swearing, quarrelling, 
Drabbing : you may go so far, 

Rey. My lord, that would dishonour him. 

Pol. 'Faith, no ; as you may season it in the charge. 
You must not put another scandal on him. 
That he is open to incontinency; 3° 

That 's not my meaning : but breathe his faults so quamtly 
That they may seem the taints of liberty, 
The flash and outbreak of a fiery mind, 
A savageness in unreclaimed blood. 
Of general assault. 

Rey. But, my good lord, — 

Pol. Wherefore should you do this? 

(885) D 



50 HAMLET. [Act II. 

Rey. Ay, my lord, 

I would know that. 

Pol. Marry, sir, here 's my drift ; 

And, I believe, it is a fetch of warrant : 
You laying these slight sullies on my son, 
As 't were a thing a little soil'd i' the working, 40 

Mark you. 

Your party in converse, him you would sound, 
Having ever seen in the prenominate crimes 
The youth you breathe of guilty, be assured 
He closes with you in this consequence; 
' Good sir', or so, or 'friend', or 'gentleman', 
According to the phrase or the addition 
Of man and country. 

Rey. Very good, my lord. 

Pol. And then, sir, does he this — he does— what was I 
about to say? By the mass, I was about to say something : 
where did I leave? 5^ 

Rey. At 'closes in the consequence', at 'friend or so', and 
'gentleman'. 

Pol. At ' closes in the consequence', ay, marry; 
He closes thus : ' I know the gentleman ; 
I saw him yesterday, or t' other day. 
Or then, or then ; with such, or such ; and, as you say 
There was a' gaming ; there o'ertook in 's rouse ; 
There falling out at tennis ' : or perchance, 
' I saw him enter such a house of sale', 60 

Videlicet, a brothel, or so forth. 
See you now ; 

Your bait of falsehood takes this carp of truth : 
And thus do we of wisdom and of reach. 
With windlasses and with assays of bias, 
By indirections find directions out : 
So by my former lecture and advice. 
Shall you my son. You have me, have you not? 

Rey. My lord, I have. 

Pol. God be wi' you ; fare you well. 

Rey. Good my lord ! 70 

Pol. Observe his inclination in yourself. 

Rey. I shall, my lord. 

Pol. And let him ply his music. 

Rey. Well, my lord. 

Pol. Farewell ! {Exit Reynaldo. 



Scene i.] HAMLET. 51 

Enter Ophelia. 

How now, Ophelia! what's the matter? 

Oph. O, my lord, my lord, I have been so affrighted ! 

Pol. With what, i' the name of God? 

Oph. My lord, as I was sewing in my closet, 
Lord Hamlet, with his doublet all unbraced; 
No hat upon his head ; his stockings foul'd, 
Ungarter'd, and down-gyved to his ancle ; 80 

Pale as his shirt; his knees knocking each other; 
And with a look so piteous in purport 
As if he had been loosed out of hell 
To speak of horrors, — he comes before me, 

Pol. Mad for thy love? 

Oph. My lord, I do not know ; 

But truly, I do fear it. 

Pol. What said he? 

oph. He took me by the wrist and held me hard; 
Then goes he to the length of all his arm ; 
And, with his other hand thus o'er his brow, 
He falls to such perusal of my face 90 

As he would draw it. Long stay'd he so ; 
At last, a little shaking of mine arm 
And thrice his head thus waving up and down, 
He raised a sigh so piteous and profound 
As it did seem to shatter all his bulk 
And end his being : that done, he lets me go : 
And, with his head over his shoulder turn'd, 
He seem'd to find his way without his eyes ; 
For out o' doors he went without their helps. 
And, to the last, bended their light on me. 1 00 

Pol. Come, go with me : I will go seek the king. 
This is the very ecstasy of love. 
Whose violent property fordoes itself 
And leads the will to desperate undertakings 
As oft as any passion under heaven 
That does afflict our natures. I am sorry. 
What, have you given him any hard words of late ? 

oph. No, my good lord, but, as you did command, 
I did repel his letters and denied 
His access to me. 

Pol. That hath made him mad, 1 10 

I am sorry that with better heed and judgement 
I had not quoted him : I fear'd he did but trifle. 
And meant to wreck thee ; but, beshrew my jealousy ! 



52 HAMLET. [Act II. 

By heaven, it is as proper to our age 

To cast beyond ourselves in our opinions 

As it is common for the younger sort 

To lack discretion. Come, go we to the king : 

This must be known ; which, being kept close, might move 

More grief to hide than hate to utter love. [Exeunt. 

Scene II, A roojn i7t the castle. 

Enter King, Queen, Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, 
and Attendants. 

King. Welcome, dear Rosencrantz and Guildenstern ! 
Moreover that we much did long to see you, 
The need we have to use you did provoke 
Our hasty sending. Something have you heard 
Of Hamlet's transformation ; so call it, 
Since nor the exterior nor the inward man 
Resembles that it was. What it should be, 
More than his father's death, that thus hath put him 
So much from the understanding of himself, 
I cannot dream of: I entreat you both, ro 

That, being of so young days brought up with him. 
And since so neighbour'd to his youth and humour. 
That you vouchsafe your rest here in our court 
Some little time : so by your companies 
To draw him on to pleasures, and to gather, 
So much as from occasion you may glean. 
Whether aught, to us unknown, afflicts him thus. 
That, open'd, lies within our remedy. 

Queen. Good gentlemen, he hath much talk'd of you ; 
And sure I am two men there are not living 20 

To whom he more adheres. If it will please you 
To show us so much gentry and good will 
As to expend your time with us awhile. 
For the supply and profit of our hope. 
Your visitation shall receive such thanks 
As fits a king's remembrance. 

Ros. Both your majesties 

Might,, by the sovereign power you have of us. 
Put your dread pleasures more into command 
Than to entreaty. 

Guil. But we both obey. 

And here give up ourselves, in the full bent 30 

To lay our service freely at your feet, 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 53 

To be commanded. 

King. Thanks, Rosencrantz and gentle Guildenstern. 
Q,uee7i. Thanks, Guildenstern and gentle Rosencrantz : 
And I beseech you instantly to visit 
My too much changed son. Go, some of you, 
And bring these gentlemen where Hamlet is. 

Guil. Heavens make our presence and our practices 
Pleasant and helpful to him ! 

Queen. Ay, amen ! 

\Exeunt Rosencrantz., Guildenstern., a7id some 

Atte?tdants. 
Enter PoLONius. 

Pol. The ambassadors from Norway, my good lord, 40 
Are joyfully return'd. . 

King. Thou still hast been the father of good news. 

Pol. Have I, my lord? I assure my good liege, 
I hold my duty, as I hold my soul. 
Both to my God and to my gracious king : 
And I do think, or else this brain of mine 
Hunts not the trail of policy so sure 
As it hath used to do, that I have found 
The very cause of Hamlet's lunacy. 

King. O, speak of that ; that do I lorig to hear. 50 

Pol. Give first admittance to the ambassadors ; 
My news shall be the fruit to that great feast. 

King. Thyself do grace to them, and bring them in. 

[Exit Polonius. 
He tells me, my dear Gertrude, he hath found 
The head and source of all your son's distemper. 

Queeit. I doubt it is no other but the main ; 
His father's death, and our o'erhasty marriage. 

King. Well, we shall sift him. 

Re-enter PoLONius, with Voltimand and Cornelius. 

Welcome, my good friends ! 
Say, Voltimand, what from our brother Norway? 

Volt. Most fair return of greetings and desires. 60 

Upon our first, he sent out to suppress 
His nephew's levies; which to him appear'd 
To be a preparation 'gainst the Polack; 
But, better look'd' into, he truly found 
It was against your highness: whereat grieved, 
That so his sickness, age and impotence 
Was falsely borne in hand, sends out arrests 
On Fortinbras; which he, in brief, obeys; 



54 HAMLET. [Act II. 

Receives rebuke from Norway, and in fine 

Makes vow before his uncle never more 70 

To give the assay of arms against your majesty. 

Whereon old Norway, overcome with joy. 

Gives him three thousand crowns in annual fee, 

And his commission to employ those soldiers, 

So levied as before, against the Polack: 

With an entreaty, herein further shown, [Giving a paper- 

That it might please you to give quiet pass 

Through your dominions for this enterprise. 

On such regards of safety and allowance 

As therein are set down. 

King. It likes us well ; 80 

And at our more consider'd time we '11 read. 
Answer, and think upon this business. 
Meantime we thank you for your well-took labour : 
Go to your rest ; at night we '11 feast together : 
Most welcome home ! \Exeunt Voltinia7id and Cornelius. 

Pol. This business is well ended. 

My liege, and madam, to expostulate 
What majesty should be, what duty is. 
Why day is day, night night, and time is time. 
Were nothing but to waste night, day and time. 
Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit, 90 

And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes, 
I will be brief: your noble son is mad : 
Mad call I it ; for, to define true madness, 
What is 't but to be nothing else but mad? 
But let that go. 

Queen. More matter, with less art. 

Pol. Madam, I swear I use no art at all. 
That he is mad, 't is true : 't is true 't is pity ; 
And pity 't is 't is true : a foolish figure ; 
But farewell it, for I will use no art. 

Mad let us grant him, then : and now remains 100 

That we find out the cause of this effect, 
Or rather say, the cause of this defect, 
For this effect defective comes by cause : 
Thus it remains, and the remainder thus. 
Perpend. 

I have a daughter — have while she is mine' — 
Who, in her duty and obedience, mark. 

Hath given me this : now gather, and surmise. {Reads. 

*To the celestial and my soul's idol, the most beautified 

Ophelia', — 1 10 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 55 

That 's an ill phrase, a vile phrase ; * beautified ' is a vile 
phrase : but you shall hear. Thus : \^Reads. 

' In her excellent white bosom, these, &^c.^ 

Queen. Came this from Hamlet to her? 

Pol. Good madam, stay awhile ; I will be faithful. \Reads. 
' Doubt thou the stars are fire; 

Doubt that the sun doth move; 
Doubt truth to be a liar; 

But never doubt I love. 1 1 9 

' O dear Ophelia, I am ill at these numbers ; I have not art 
to reckon my groans : but that I love thee best, O most best, 
believe it. Adieu. 

' Thine evermore, most dear lady, whilst this 
machine is to him, HAMLET.' 
This, in obedience, hath my daughter shown me, 
And more above, hath his solicitings, 
As they fell out by time, by means and place, 
All given to mine ear. 

King. But how hath she 

Received his love? 

Pol. What do you think of me ? 

KiJig. As of a man faithful and honourable. 130 

Pol. I would fain prove so. But what might you think. 
When I had seen this hot love on the wing — 
As I perceived it, I must tell you that. 
Before my daughter told me — what might you. 
Or my dear majesty your queen here, think, 
If I had play'd the desk or table-book. 
Or given my heart a winking, mute and dumb. 
Or look'd upon this love with idle sight ; 
What might you think? No, I went round to work, 
And my young mistress thus I did bespeak: 140 

' Lord Hamlet is a prince, out of thy star; 
This must not be' : and then I prescripts gave her. 
That she should lock herself from his resort. 
Admit no messengers, receive no tokens. 
Which done, she took the fruits of my advice ; 
And he, repulsed — a short tale to make — 
Fell into a sadness, then into a fast. 
Thence to a watch, thence into a weakness. 
Thence to a lightness, and, by this declension, 
Into the madness wherein now he raves, 150 

And all we mourn for. 

King. Do you think 't is this? 

Queen. It may be, very likely. 



56 HAMLET. [Act II, 

Pol. Hath there been such a time — I 'd fain know that — 
That I have positively said ' 'T is so ', 
When it proved otherwise? 

King. Not that I know. 

Pol. \Poi?iting to Ms head aiid shoulder^ Take this from 
this, if this be otherwise : 
If circumstances lead me, I M'ill find 
Where truth is hid, though it were hid indeed 
Within the centre. 

Kmg. How may we try it further? 

Pol. You know, sometimes he walks four hours together 
Here in the lobby. 

Quee7t. So he does indeed. i6i 

Pol. At such a time I '11 loose my daughter to him : 
Be you and I behind an arras then ; 
Mark the encounter : if he love her not 
And be not from his reason fall'n thereon, 
Let me be no assistant for a state, 
But keep a farm and carters. 

King. We will try it. 

Q,uee7t. But, look, where sadly the poor wretch comes 
reading. 

Pol. Away, I do beseech you, both away : 
I '11 board him presently. 

{Exeunt King, Queen, and Atte7idants. 

Enter Hamlet, reading. 

O, give me leave: 170 

How does my good Lord Hamlet? 

Ham. Well, God-a-mercy. 

Pol. Do you know me, my lord? 

Ham. Excellent well ; you are a fishmonger. 

Pol. Not I, my lord. 

Ham. Then I would you were so honest a man. 

Pol. Honest, my lord ! 

Ham. Ay, sir; to be honest, as this world goes, is to be 
one man picked out of ten thousand. 

Pol. That 's very true, my lord. 180 

Ham. For if the sun breed maggots in a dead dog, being a 
god kissing carrion, — Have you a daughter? 

Pol. I have, my lord. 

Ham. Let her not walk i' the sun : conception is a blessing : 
but not as your daughter may conceive. Friend, look to 't. 

Pol. [Aside] How say you by that? Still harping on my 
daughter : yet he knew me not at first ; he said I was a fish- 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 57 

monger : he is far gone, far gone : and truly in my youth I 
suffered much extremity for love ; very near this. I '11 speak 
to him again. What do you read, my lord? 

Ham. Words, words, words. 

Pol. What is the matter, my lord? 

Ham. Between who? 

Pol. I mean, the matter that you read, my lord. 

Ham. Slanders, sir : for the satirical rogue says here that 
old men have grey beards, that their faces are wrinkled, their 
eyes purging thick amber and plum-tree gum and that they 
have a plentiful lack of wit, together with most weak hams : 
all which, sir, though I most powerfully and potently believe, 
yet I hold it not honesty to have it thus set down, for your- 
self, sir, should be old as I am, if like a crab you could go 
backward. 

Pol. [Aside] Though this be madness, yet there is method 
in't. Will you walk out of the air, my lord? 

Ham. Into my grave. 210 

Pol. Indeed, that is out o' the air. [Aside] How pregnant 
sometimes his replies are ! a happiness that often madness 
hits on, which reason and sanity could not so prosperously 
be delivered of. I will leave him, and suddenly contrive the 
means of meeting between him and my daughter. — My hon- 
ourable lord, I will most humbly take my leave of you. 

Ham. You cannot, sir, take from me any thing that I will 
more willingly part withal: except my life, except my life, 
except my life. 221 

Pol. Fare you well, my lord. 

Ham. These tedious old fools ! 

Enter Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. 

Pol. You go to seek the Lord Hamlet ; there he is. 

Ros. [To Poloniiis] God save you, sir ! [Exit Poloniiis. 

Giiil. My honoured lord ! 

Ros. My most dear lord ! 

Ham. My excellent good friends ! How dost thou, Guil- 
denstern? Ah, Rosencrantz! Good lads, how do ye both? 

Ros. As the indifferent children of the earth. 231 

Guil. Happy, in that we are not over-happy; 
On fortune's cap we are not the very button. 

Ham. Nor the soles of her shoe? 

Ros. Neither, my lord. 

Ham. Then you live about her waist, or in the middle ot 
her favours? What's the news? 240 

Ros. None, my lord, but that the world's grown honest. 



58 HAMLET. [Act II. 

Ha7n. Then is doomsday near : but your news is not true. 
Let me question more in particular : what have you, my good 
friends, deserved at the hands of fortune, that she sends you 
to prison hither? 

Guil. Prison, my lord ! 

Ham. Denmark's a prison. 

Ros. Then is the world one. 250 

Ham. A goodly one ; in which there are many confines, 
wards and dungeons, Denmark being one o' the worst. 

Ros. We think not so, my lord. 

Ha7n. Why, then, 't is none to you ; for there is nothing 
either good or bad, but thinking makes it so : to me it is a 
prison, 

Ros. Why then, your ambition makes it one ; 't is too 
narrow for your mind. 259 

Ham. O God, I could be bounded in a nut-shell and count 
myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad 
dreams. 

Guil. Which dreams indeed are ambition, for the very 
substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a 
dream. 

Ham. A dream itself is but a shadow. 

Ros. Truly, and I hold ambition of so airy and light a 
quality that it is but a shadow's shadow. 

Ham. Then are our beggars bodies, and our monarchs 
and outstretched heroes th-e beggars' shadows. Shall we to 
the court? for, by my fay, I cannot reason. 

(- '■] \ We '11 wait upon you. 

Ham. No such m.atter : I will not sort you with the rest of 
my servants, for, to speak to you like an honest man, I am 
most dreadfully attended. But, in the beaten way of friend- 
ship, what make you at Elsinore? 

Ros. To visit you, my lord ; no other occasion. 

Ham. Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks ; but I 
thank you : and sure, dear friends, my thanks are too dear a 
halfpenny. Were you not sent for? Is it your own inclining? 
Is it a free visitation? Come, deal justly with me: come, 
come ; nay, speak. 

Gtiil. What should we say, my lord? 

Ham. Why, any thing, but to the purpose. You were sent 
for; and there is a kind of confession in your looks which 
your modesties have not craft enough to colour : I know the 
good king and queen have sent for you. 291 

Ros. To what end, my lord? 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 59 

Ham. That you must teach me. But let me conjure you, 
by the rights of our fellowship, by the consonancy of our 
youth, by the obligation of our ever-preserved love, and by 
what more dear a better proposer could charge you withal, be 
even and direct with me, whether you were sent for, or no? 

Ros. [Aside to Giiil.'\ What say you? 300 

Ham. [Aside] Nay, then, I have an eye of you. — If you 
love me, hold not off. 

Gm7. My lord, we were sent for. 

Ham. I will tell you why ; so shall my anticipation prevent 
your discovery, and your secrecy to the king and queen moult 
no feather. I have of late — but wherefore I know not — lost 
all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises ; and indeed it 
goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, 
the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory, this most excel- 
lent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o'erhanging firma- 
ment, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it 
appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent con- 
gregation of vapours. What a piece of work is a man ! how 
noble in reason ! how infinite in faculty ! in form and moving 
how express and admirable ! in action how like an angel ! in 
apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the world! the 
paragon of animals ! And yet, to me, what is this quintes- 
sence of dust? man delights not me: no, nor woman neither, 
though by your smiling you seem to say so. 

Ros. My lord, there was no such stuff in my thoughts. 

Ham. Why did you laugh then, when I said ' man delights 
not mc ' ? 

Ros. To think, my lord, if you delight not in man, what 
lenten entertainment the players shall receive from you : we 
coted them on the way; and hither are they coming, to offer 
you service. 

Ham. He that plays the king shall be welcome ; his 
majesty shall have tribute of me; the adventurous knight 
shall use his foil and target; the lover shall not sigh gratis; 
the humorous man shall end his part in peace; the clown 
shall make those laugh whose lungs are tickle o' the sere; 
and the lady shall say her mind freely, or the blank verse 
shall halt for 't. What players are they? 340 

Ros. Even those you were wont to take delight in, the 
tragedians of the city. 

Ha/n. How chances it they travel? their residence, both in 
reputation and profit, was better both ways. 

Ros. I think their inhibition comes by the means of the 
late innovation. 



6o HAMLET. [Act II. 

Ham. Do they hold the same estimation they did when I 
was in the city.'* are they so followed? 350 

Ros. No, indeed, are they not. 

Ham. How comes it.-^ do they grow rusty? 

Ros. Nay, their endeavour keeps in the wontea pace : but 
there is, sir, an aery of children, little eyases, that cry out on 
the top of question, and are most tyrannically clapped for't: 
these are now the fashion, and so berattle the common 
stages — so they call them — that many wearing rapiers are 
afraid of goose-quills and dare scarce come thither. 360 

Ham. What, are they children? who maintains 'em? how 
are they escoted? Will they pursue the quality no longer 
than they can sing? will they not say afterw^ards, if they 
should grow themselves to common players — as it is most 
like, if their means are no better — their writers do them 
wrong, to make them exclaim against their own succession? 

Ros. 'Faith, there has been much to do on both sides ; and 
the nation holds it no sin to tarre them to controversy: there 
was, for a while, no money bid for argument, unless the poet 
and the player went to cuffs in the question. 

Ham. Is 't possible? 

Guil. O, there has been much throwing about of brains. 

Ham. Do the boys carry it away? 

Ros. Ay, that they do, my lord; Hercules and his load 
too. ... 379 

Ham. It is not very strange; for mine uncle is king of 
Denmark, and those that would make mows at him while my 
father lived, give twenty, forty, fifty, an hundred ducats a- 
piece for his picture in little. 'Sblood, there is something in 
this more than natural, if philosophy could find it out. 

{Flourish of trumpets within. 

Guil. There are the players. 

Ham. Gentlemen, you are welcome to Elsinore. Your 
hands, come then: the appurtenance of welcome is fashion 
and ceremony: let me comply with you in this garb, lest my 
extent to the players, which, I tell you, must show fairly out- 
ward, should more appear like entertainment than yours. 
You are welcome: but my uncle-father and aunt-mother are 
deceived. 

Guil. In what, my dear lord? 

Hain. I am but mad north-north-west: when the wind is 
southerly I know a hawk from a handsaw. 
Re-e7iter POLONIUS. 

Pol. Well be with you, gentlemen I 

Hani. Hark you, Guildenstern; and you too: at each ear 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 61 

a hearer: that great baby you see there is not yet out of his 
swaddhng-clouts. 

Ros. Happily he 's the second time come to them ; for they 
say an old man is twice a child. 

Ham. I will prophesy he comes to tell me of the players; 
mark it. You say right, sir: o' Monday morning; 'twas so 
indeed. 

Pol. My lord, I have news to tell you. 

Hmn. My lord, I have news to tell you. When Roscius 
was an actor in Rome, — 410 

Pol. The actors are come hither, my lord. 

Ham. Buz, buz ! 

Pol. Upon mine honour, — 

Ham. Then came each actor on his ass, — 

Pol. The best actors in the world, either for tragedy, 
comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, historical-pas- 
toral, tragical-historical, tragical-comical-historical-pastoral, 
scene individable, or poem unlimited: Seneca cannot be too 
heavy, nor Plautus too light. For the law of writ and the 
liberty, these are the only men. 42 1 

Ham. O Jephthah, judge of Israel, what a treasure hadst 
thou! 

Pol. What a treasure had he, my lord? 

Ham,. Why, 

' One fair daughter, and no more, 
The which he loved passing well' . 

Pol. \Aside\ Still on my daughter. 

Ham. Am I not i' the right, old Jephthah? 

Pol. If you call me Jephthah, my lord, I have a daughter 
that I love passing well. . 431 

Ham. Nay, that follows not. 

Pol. What follows, then, my lord? 

Ham. Why, 

' As by lot, God wot ', 
and then, you know, 

' It came to pass, as most like it was ', — 
the first row of the pious chanson will show you more; for 
look, where my abridgement comes. 

Enter four or five Players, 

You are welcome, masters; welcome, all. I am glad to see 
thee well. Welcome, good friends. O, my old friend ! thy 
face is valanced since I saw thee last: comest thou to beard 
me in Denmark? What, my young lady and mistress ! By 'r 
lady, your ladyship is nearer to heaven than when I saw you 



62 HAMLET. [Act II. 

last, by the altitude of a chopine. Pray God, your voice, 
like a piece of uncurrent gold, be not cracked within the 
ring. Masters, you are all welcome. We '11 e'en to 't like 
French falconers, fly at any thing we see: we'll have a speech 
straight: come, give us a taste of your quality; come, a 
passionate speech. 

First Player. What speech, my lord? 

Ham. I heard thee speak me a speech once, but it was 
never acted; or, if it was, not above once; for the play, I 
remember, pleased not the million; 'twas caviare to the 
general: but it was — as I received it, and others, whose 
judgements in such matters cried in the top of mine — an ex- 
cellent play, w^ell digested in the scenes, set down with as 
much modesty as cunning. I remember, one said there were 
no sallets in the lines to make the matter savoury, nor no 
matter in the phrase that might indict the author of affecta- 
tion; but called it an honest method, as wholesome as sweet, 
and by very much more handsome than fine. One speech in 
it I chiefly loved: 't was Eneas' tale to Dido; and thereabout 
of it especially, where he speaks of Priam's slaughter: if it 
live in your memory, begin at this line: let me see, let me 
see — 47 1 

'The rugged Pyrrhus, like the Hyrcanian beast',, — it is not so: 
— it begins with Pyrrhus: — 

' The rugged Pyrrhus, he Avhose sable arms, 
Black as his purpose, did the night resemble 
When he lay couched in the ominous horse, 
Hath now this dread and black complexion smear'd 
With heraldry more dismal ; head to foot 
Now is he total gules; horridly trick'd 
With blood of fathers, mothers, daughters, sons, 
Baked and impasted with the parching streets, 
That lend a tyrannous and damned light 
To their lord's murder: roasted in wrath and fire, 
And thus o'er-sized with coagulate gore, 
With eyes like carbuncles, the hellish Pyrrhus 
Old grandsire Priam seeks.' 
So, proceed you. 

Pol. 'Fore God, my lord, well spoken, with good accent and 
good discretion. 

First Player. ' Anon he finds him 

Striking too short at Greeks; his antique sword, 
Rebellious to his arm, lies where it falls, 
Repugnant to command: unequal match'd, 
Pyrrhus at Priam drives ; in rage strikes wide; 



Scene 2.] HAMLET, 63 

But with the whiff and wind of his fell sword 

The unnerved father falls. Then senseless Ilium, 

Seeming to feel this blow, with flaming top 

Stoops to his base, and with a hideous crash 

Takes prisoner Pyrrhus' ear: for, lo! his sword 

Which was declining on the milky head 500 

Of reverend Priam, seem'd i' the air to stick: 

So, as a painted tyrant, Pyrrhus stood, 

And like a neutral to his will and matter, 

Did nothing. 

But, as we often see, against some storm, 

A silence in the heavens, the rack stand still, 

The bold winds speechless and the orb below 

As hush as death, anon the dreadful thunder 

Doth rend the region, so, after Pyrrhus' pause. 

Aroused vengeance sets him new a-work; 510 

And never did the Cyclops' hammers fall 

On Mars's armour forged for proof eterne 

With less remorse than Pyrrhus' bleeding sword 

Now falls on Priam. 

Out, out, thou strumpet, Fortune ! All you gods, 

In general synod, take away her power: 

Break all the spokes and fellies from her wheel. 

And bowl the round nave down the hill of heaven, 

As low as to the fiends !' 

Pol. This is too long. 520 

Ham. It shall to the barber's, with your beard. Prithee, 

say on : he 's for a jig or a tale of bawdry, or he sleeps : say 

on: come to Hecuba. 

First Player. 'But who, O, who had seen the mobled 

queen — ' 

Ham. 'The mobled queen?' 

Pol. That's good; 'mobled queen' is good. 

First Player. ' Run barefoot up and down, threatening the 

flames 
With bisson rheum; a clout upon that head 
Where late the diadem stood, and for a robe, 530 

About her lank and all o'er-teemed loins, 
A blanket, in the alarm of fear caught up; 
Who this had seen, with tongue in venom steep'd, 
'Gainst Fortune's state would treason have pronounced: 
But if the gods themselves did see her then 
When she saw Pyrrhus make malicious sport 
In mincing with his sword her husband's limbs. 
The instant burst of clamour that she made, 



64 HAMLET. ' [Act II. 

Unless things mortal move them not at all, 

Would have made milch the burning eyes of heaven, 540 

And passion in the gods.' 

Pol. Look, whether he has not turned his colour and has 
tears in 's eyes. Pray you, no more. 

Ham. 'T is well; I'll have thee speak out the rest soon. 
Good my lord, will you see the players well bestowed? Do 
you hear, let them be well used; for they are the abstract 
and brief chronicles of the time: after your death you were 
better have a bad epitaph than their ill report while you live, 

Pol. My lord, I will use them according to their desert. 

Ham. God's bodykins, man, much better: use every man 
after his desert, and who should 'scape whipping? Use 
them after your own honour and dignity: the less they 
deserve, the more merit is in your bounty. Take them in. 

Pol. Come, sirs. 55.9 

Ham. Follow him, friends : we '11 hear a play to-morrow. 
{Exit Polo7ti2is with all the players btct the First.^ Dost 
thou hear me, old friend; can you play the Murder of Gon- 
zago? 

First Player. Ay, my lord. 

Ham. We '11 ha 't to-morrow night. You could, for a need, 
study a speech of some dozen or sixteen lines, which I would 
set down and insert in 't, could you not ? 

First Player. Ay, my lord. 569 

Ham. Very well. Follow that lord; and look you mock 
him not. {Exit First Player?^ My good friends, I '11 leave 
you till night : you are welcome to Elsinore. 

Ros. Good my lord ! 

Ham. Ay, so, God be wi' ye ; {Exeunt Rosencrantz and 
Guildenstern.~\ Now I am alone. 
O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I ! 
Is it not monstrous that this player here. 
But in a fiction, in a dream of passion, 
Could force his soul so to his own conceit 
That from her working all his visage wann'd, 580 

Tears in his eyes, distraction in 's aspect, 
A broken voice, and his whole function suiting 
With forms to his conceit? and all for nothing! 
For Hecuba ! 

What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba, 
That he should weep for her? What would he do, 
Had he the motive and the cue for passion 
That I have? He would drown the stage with tears 
And cleave the general ear with horrid speech. 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 65 

Make mad the guilty and appal the free, 590 

Confound the ignorant, and amaze indeed 

The very faculties of eyes and ears. 

Yet I, 

A dull and muddy-mettled rascal, peak, 

Like John-a-dreams, unpregnant of my cause, 

And can say nothing ; no, not for a king, 

Upon whose property and most dear life 

A damn'd defeat was made. Am I a coward? 

Who calls me villain? breaks my pate across? 

Plucks off my beard, and blows it in my face? 600 

Tweaks me by the nose? gives me the lie i' the throat, 

As deep as to the lungs? who does me this? 

Ha! 

'Swounds, I should take it : for it cannot be 

But I am pigeon-Iiver'd and lack gall 

To make oppression bitter, or ere this 

I should have fatted all the region kites 

With this slave's offal : bloody, bawdy villain 1 

Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain ! 

O, vengeance! 610 

Why, what an ass am I ! This is most brave. 

That I, the son of a dear father murder'd, 

Prompted to my revenge by heaven and hell. 

Must, like a whore, unpack my heart with words, 

And fall a-cursing, like a very drab, 

A scullion ! 

Fie upon 't ! foh ! About, my brain ! I have heard 

That guilty creatures sitting at a play 

Have by the very cunning of the scene 

Been struck so to the soul that presently 620 

They have proclaim'd their malefactions ; 

For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak 

With most miraculous organ. I '11 have these players 

Play something like the murder of my father 

Before mine uncle : I '11 observe his looks ; 

I '11 tent him to the quick : if he but blench, 

I know my course. The spirit that I have seen 

May be the devil : and the devil hath power 

To assume a pleasing shape ; yea, and perhaps 

Out of my weakness and my melancholy, 630 

As he is very potent with such spirits, 

Abuses me to damn me : I '11 have grounds 

More relative than this : the play's the thing 

Wherein I '11 catch the conscience of the king. {Exit, 

(885) E 



66 HAMLET. [Act III. 

ACT III. 

Scene I. A room in the castle. 

Enter King, Queen, Polonius, Ophelia, Rosencrantz, 
and Guildenstern. 

King. And can you, by no drift of circumstance, 
Get from hinx why he puts on this confusion, 
Grating so harshly all his days of quiet 
With turbulent and dangerous lunacy? 

Ros. He does confess he feels himself distracted ; 
But from what cause he will by no means speak. 

Guil. Nor do we find him forward to be sounded, 
But, with a crafty madness, keeps aloof,. 
When we would bring him on to some confession 
Of his true state. 

Queen. Did he receive you well? • ' lo 

Ros. Most like a gentleman. 

Guil. But with n\uch forcing of his disposition. 

Ros. Niggard of question ; but, of our demands, 
Most free in his reply. 

Qiieen. Did you assay him 

To any pastime? 

Ros. Madam, it so fell out, that certain pla)'ers 
We o'er-raught on the way : of these we told him ; 
And there did seem in him a kind of joy 
To hear of it : they are about the court. 

And, as I think, they have already order 20 

This night to play before him. 

Pol. 'T is most true : 

And he beseech'd me to entreat your majesties 
To hear and see the matter. 

King. With all my heart ; and it doth much content me 
To hear him so inclined. 
Good gentlemen, give him a further edge, 
And drive his purpose on to these delights. 

Ros. We shall, my lord. 

\Exeunt Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. 

King. Sweet Gertrude, leave us too ; 

For we have closely sent for Hamlet hither. 
That he, as 't were by accident, may here 30 

Affront Ophelia: ^ 

Her father and myself, lawful espials. 
Will so bestow ourselves that, seeing, unseen. 



Scene i.] HAMLET. 67 

We may of their encounter frankly judge, 
And gather by him, as he is behaved, 
If't be the affliction of his love or no 
That thus he suffers for. 

Queen. I shall obey you. 

And for your part, Ophelia, I do wish 
That your good beauties be the happy cause 
Of Hamlet's wildness : so shall I hope your virtues 40 

Will bring him to his wonted way again. 
To both your honours. 

Oph. Madam, I wish it may. \Exit Queen. 

Pol. Ophelia, walk you here. Gracious, so please you, 
We will bestow ourselves. \To Ophelia\ Read on this book; 
That show of such an exercise may colour 
Your loneliness. We are oft to blame in this, — 
'T is too much proved — that with devotion's visage 
And pious action we do sugar o'er 
The devil himself. 

Kiitg. [Asz'de] O, 't is too true ! 
How smart a lash that speech doth give my conscience ! 50 
The harlot's cheek, beautied with plastering art. 
Is not more ugly to the thing that helps it 
Than is my deed to my most painted word : 
O heavy burthen ! 

Pol. I hear him coming : let 's withdraw, my lord. 

[Exeunt King and Polonius. 

Enter Hamlet. 

Ham. To be, or not to be : that is the question : 
Whether 't is nobler in the mind to suffer 
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, 
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles. 
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep; 60 

No more ; and by a sleep to say we end 
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks 
That flesh is heir to, 't is a consummation 
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep ; 
To sleep : perchance to dream : ay, there 's the rub ; 
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come 
W^hen we have shuffled off this mortal coil, 
Must give us pause : there 's the respect 
That makes calamity of so long life ; 

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, 70 

The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, 
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay, 

/ 



68 HAMLET. [Act III. 

The insolence of office and the spurns 

That patient merit of the unworthy takes, 

When he himself might his quietus make 

With a bare bodkin ? who would fardels bear. 

To grunt and sweat under a weary life, 

But that the dread of something after death. 

The undiscover'd country from whose bourn 

No traveller returns, puzzles the will ' 80 

And makes us rather bear those ills we have 

Than fly to others that we know not of? 

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all ; 

And thus the native hue of resolution 

Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought. 

And enterprises of great pitch and moment 

With this regard their currents turn awry. 

And lose the name of action. — Soft you now ! 

The fair Ophelia ! Nymph, in thy orisons 

Be all my sins remember'd. 

Oph. Good my lord, 90 

How does your honour for this many a day? 

Ham. I humbly thank you ; well, well, well. 

Oph. My lord, I have remembrances of yours, 
That I have longed long to re-deliver ; 
I pray you, now receive them. 

Ham. No, not I ; 

I never gave you aught. 

Oph. My honour'd lord, you know right well you did ; 
And, with them, words of so sweet breath composed 
As made the things more rich : their perfume lost, 
Take these again ; for to the noble mind 100 

Rich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind. 
There, my lord. 

Ham. Ha, ha! are you honest? 

Oph. My lord? 

Ham. Are you fair? 

Oph. What means your lordship ? 

Ham. That if you be honest and fair, your honesty should 
admit no discourse to your beauty. 

Oph. Could beauty, my lord, have better commerce than 
with honesty? ^ no 

Ham. Ay, truly ; for the power of beauty will sooner trans- 
form honesty from what it is to a bawd than the force of 
honesty can translate beauty into his likeness : this was some- 
time a paradox, but now the time gives it proof. I did love 
you once. 



Scene i.] HAMLET. 69 

■ Oph. Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so. 

Ham. You should not have believed me ; for virtue cannot 
so inoculate our old stock but we shall relish of it : I loved you 
not. 1 20 

Oph. I was the more deceived. 

Ham. Get thee to a nunnery: why wouldst thou be a 
breeder of sinners? I am myself indifferent honest; but yet 
I could accuse me of such things that it were better my 
mother had not borne me : I am very proud, revengeful, 
ambitious, with more offences at my beck than I have 
thoughts to put them in, imagination to give them shape, or 
time to act them in. What should such fellows as I do crawling 
between earth and heaven? We are arrant knaves, all; believe 
none of us. Go thy ways to a nunnery. Where 's your father? 

Oph. At home, my lord. 

Ham. Let the doors be shut upon him, that he may play 
the fool no where but in 's own house. Farewell. 

Oph. O, help him, you sweet heavens ! 

Ham. If thou dost marry, I '11 give thee this plague for thy 
dowry : be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as snow, thou shalt 
not escape calumny. Get thee to a nunnery, go : farewell. 
Or, if thou wilt needs marry, marry a fool ; for wise men know 
well enough what monsters you make of them. To a nunnery, 
go, and quickly too. Farewell. 

Oph. O heavenly powers, restore him! 

Ham. I have heard of your paintings too, well enough ; 
God has given you one face, and you make yourselves 
another: you jig, you amble, and you lisp, and nick-name 
God's creatures, and make your wantonness your ignorance. 
Go to, I '11 no more on 't ; it hath made me mad. I say, we 
will have no more marriages : those that are married already, 
all but one, shall live ; the rest shall keep as they are. To a 
nunnery, go. \Exit. 

Oph. O, what a noble mind is here o'erthrown ! 
The courtier's, soldier's, scholar's, eye, tongue, sword ; 
The expectancy and rose of the fair state, 160 

The glass of fashion and the mould of form. 
The observed of all observers, quite, quite down ! 
And I, of ladies most deject and wretched. 
That suck'd the honey of his music vows, 
Now see that noble and most sovereign reason, 
Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh ; 
That unmatch'd form and feature of blown youth 
Blasted with ecstasy : O, woe is me, 
To have seen what I have seen, see what I see ! 



70 HAMLET. [Act III. 

Re-enter King and Polonius. 

King. Love! his affections do not that way tend; 170 

Nor what he spake, though it lack'd form a Uttle, 
Was not Hke madness. There 's something in his soul, 
O'er which his melancholy sits on brood ; 
And I do doubt the hatch and the disclose 
Will be some danger: which for to prevent, 
I have in quick determination 

Thus set it down : he shall with speed to England, 
For the demand of our neglected tribute : 
Haply the seas and countries different 

With variable objects shall expel 180 

This something-settled matter in his heart, 
Whereon his brains still beating puts him thus 
From fashion of himself What think you on't.'' 

Pol. It shall do well : but yet do I believe 
The origin and commencement of his grief 
Sprung from neglected love. How now, Ophelia! 
You need not tell us what Lord Hamlet said ; 
We heard it all. My lord, do as you.please; 
But, if you hold it fit, after the play 

Let his queen mother all alone entreat him 190 

To show his grief: let her be round with him ; 
And I '11 be placed, so please you, in the ear 
Of all their conference. If she find him not. 
To England send him, or confine him where 
Your wisdom best shall think. 

King. It shall be so : 

Madness in great ones must not unwatch'd go. [Exeunt. 

Scene II. A hall in the castle. 

Enter Hamlet and Players. 

Ham. Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to 
you, trippingly on the tongue : but if you mouth it, as many 
of your players do, I had as lief the town-crier spoke my lines. 
Nor do not saw the air too much with your hand, thus, but 
use all gently ; for in the very torrent, tempest, and, as I may 
say, the whirlwind of passion, you must acquire and beget a 
temperance that may give it smoothness. O, it offends me to 
the soul to hear a robustious periwig-pated fellow tear a pas- 
sion to tatters, to very rags, to split the ears of the ground- 
lings, who for the most part are capable of nothing but inex- 
plicable dumb-shows and noise : I would have such a fellow 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 71 

whipped for o'erdoing Terrrtagant; it outherods Herod: pray 
you, avoid it. 

First Player. I warrant your honour. 

Ham. Be not too tame neither, but let your own discretion 
be your tutor: suit the action to the word, the word to the 
action ; with this special observance, that you o'erstep not the 
modesty of nature : for any thing so overdone is from the 
purpose of playing, whose end, both at the first and now, was 
and is, to hold, as 'twere, the mirror up to nature; to show- 
virtue her own feature, scorn her own image, and the very age 
and body of the time his form and pressure. Now this over- 
done, or come tardy off, though it make the unskilful laugh, 
cannot but make the judicious grieve ; the censure of the 
which one must in your allowance o'erweigh a whole theatre 
of others. O, there be players that I have seen play, and 
heard others praise, and that highly, not to speak it profanely, 
that, neither having the accent of Christians nor the gait of 
Christian, pagan, nor man, have so strutted and bellowed that I 
have thought some of nature's journeymen had made men and 
not made them well, they imitated humanity so abominably. 

First Player. I hope we have reformed that indifferently 
with us, sir. 41 

Ham. O, reform it altogether. And let those that play 
your clowns speak no more than is set down for them; for 
there be of them that will themselves laugh, to set on some 
quantity of barren spectators to laugh too; though, in the 
mean time, some necessary question of the play be then to be 
considered : that 's villanous, and shows a most pitiful ambi- 
tion in the fool that uses it. Go, make you ready. 

[Exeunt Players. 

Enter POLONIUS, ROSENCRANTZ, and GUILDENSTERN. 

How now, my lord ! will the king hear this piece of work? 
Pol. And the queen too, and that presently. 
Ham. Bid the players make haste. {Exit Polojiius.^ Will 
you two help to hasten them? 

cTdi. \ ^^ ^'^"' "^y ^°^^- 

\Exe24.?it Rosencrantz and Gitiuienstern. 
Ham. What ho ! Horatio ! 

Enter Horatio. 

Hor. Here, sweet lord, at your service. 
Ham. Horatio, thou art e'en as just a man 
As e'er my conversation coped withal. 6fc) 



72 HAMLET. [Act III. 

Hor. O, my dear lord, — 

Haj7i. Nay, do not think I flatter ; 

For what advancement may I hope from thee 
That no revenue hast but thy good spirits, 
To feed and clothe thee? Why should the poor be flatter'd? 
No, let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp, 
And crook the pregnant hinges of the knee 
Where thrift may follow fawning. Dost thou hear? 
Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice 
And could of men distinguish, her election 
Hath seal'd thee for herself; for thou hast been 70 

As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing, 
A man that fortune's buffets and rewards 
Hast ta'en with equal thanks : and blest are those 
Whose blood and judgement are so well commingled, 
That they are not a pipe for fortune's finger 
To sound what stop she please. Give me that man 
That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him 
In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart, 
As I do thee. — Something too much of this. — 
There is a play to-night before the king; 80 

One scene of it comes near the circumstance 
Which I have told thee of my father's death : 
I prithee, when thou seest that act afoot. 
Even with the very comment of thy soul 
Observe mine uncle : if his -occulted guilt 
Do not itself unkennel in one speech, 
It is a damned ghost that we have seen, 
And my imaginations are as foul 
As Vulcan's stithy. Give him heedful note ; 
For I mine eyes will rivet to his face, 90 

And after we will both our judgements join 
In censure of his seeming. 

Hor. Well, my lord : 

If he steal aught the whilst this play is playing. 
And 'scape detecting, I will pay the theft. 

Ham. They are coming to the play ; I must be idle : 
Get you a place. 

Danish inarch. A flourish. Enter King, Queen, Polo- 
Nius, Ophelia, Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, and 
others. 

King. How fares our cousin Hamlet? 

Ham. Excellent, i' faith ; of the chameleon's dish : I eat 
the air, promise-crammed: you cannot feed capons so. 100 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 73 

Ki7ii^. I have nothing with this answer, Hamlet; these 
words are not mine. 

Ham. No, nor mine now. \To PoIonius^\ My lord, you 
played once i' the university, you say? 

Pol. That did I, my lord ; and was accounted a good actor. 

Ham. What did you enact? 

Pol. I did enact Julius Caesar : I was killed 1' the Capitol ; 
Brutus killed me. 

Ham. It was a brute part of him to kill so capital a calf 
there. Be the players ready? 1 1 1 

Ros. Ay, my lord ; they stay upon your patience. 

Queen. Come hither, my dear Hamlet, sit by me. 

Ham. No, good mother, here 's metal more attractive. 

Pol. [To the Ki7tg\ O, ho ! do you mark that? 

Oph. You are merry, my lord. 

Ham. Who, I? 13° 

Oph. Ay, my lord. 

Ham. O God, your only jig-maker. What should a man do 
but be merry? for, look you, how cheerfully my mother looks, 
and my father died within these two hours. 

Oph. Nay, 'tis twice two months, my lord. 

Ham. So long? Nay then, let the devil wear black, for I '11 
have a suit of sables. O heavens ! die two months ago, and 
not forgotten yet? Then there's hope a great man's memory 
may outlive his life half a year: but, by'r lady, he must build 
churches, then ; or else shall he suffer not thinking on, with 
the hobby-horse, whose epitaph is 'For, O, for, O, the hobby- 
horse is forgot'. 

Hautboys play. The dumb-show enters. 

Enter a King and a Queen very lovingly; the Queen e^n- 
bracing him, and he her. She kneels^ and makes show of 
protestation unto him. He takes her up, and decli7ies his 
head upon her neck: lays him down upon a bank of 
flowers: she, seeiftg hijn asleep, leaves him. Anon comes 
in a fellow, takes off his crown, kisses it, and pours poison 
in the King's ears^ and exit. The Queen returns; finds 
the King dead, and makes passionate action. The 
Poisoner, with some two or three Mutes, comes in again, 
seeining to lament with her. The dead body is carried 
away. The Poisoner wooes the Queen with gifts: she 
seems loath and unwilling awhile, but in the end accepts 
his love. [Exeunt. 

Oph. What means this, my lord? 148 



74 HAMLET. [Act III. 

Ham. Marry, this is miching mallecho ; it means mischief. 
Oph. Behke this show imports the argument of the play. 

Enter Prologue. 

Ham. We shall know by this fellow: the players cannot 
keep counsel ; they '11 tell all. 

Pro. For us, and for our tragedy. 

Here stooping to your clemency, i6o 

We beg your hearing patiently. \Exit. 

Ham. Is this a prologue, or the posy of a ring? 
Oph. 'T is brief, my lord. 
Ham. As woman's love. 

Enter two Players, King and Queen. 

P. King. Full thirty times hath Phoebus' cart gone round 
Neptune's salt-wash and Tellus' orbed ground, 
And thirty dozen moons with borrow'd sheen 
About the world have times twelve thirties been 
Since love our hearts and Hymen did our hands 
Unite commutual in most sacred bands. 170 

P. Queen. So many journeys may the sun and moon 
Make us again count o'er ere love be done ! 
But, woe is me, you are so sick of late. 
So far from cheer and from your former state, 
That I distrust you. Yet, though I distrust, 
Discomfort you, my lord, it nothing must : ^ 
For women's fear and love holds quantity ; 
In neither aught, or in extremity. 
Now, what my love is, proof hath made you know ; 
And as my love is sized, my fear is so : 180 

Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear ; 
Where little fears grow great, great love grows there. 

P. King. ' Faith, I must leave thee, love, and shortly too , 
My operant powers their functions leave to do : 
And thou shalt live in this fair world behind, 
Honour'd, beloved ; and haply one as kind 
For husband shalt thou — 

P. Queen. O, confound the rest ! 

Such love must needs be treason in my breast : 
In second husband let me be accurst ! 

None wed the second but who kill'd the first. 190 

Hain. \Aside\ Wormwood, wormwood. 

P. Quee7i. The instances that second marriage move 
Are base respects of thrift, but none of love : 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 75 

A second time I kill my husband dead, 
When second husband kisses me in bed. 

P. Kino-. I do believe you think what now you speak ; 
But what we do determine oft we break. 
Purpose is but the slave to memory, 
Of violent birth, but poor validity : 

Which now, like fruit unripe, sticks on the tree ; 200 

But fall, unshaken, when they mellow be. 
Most necessary 't is that we forget 
To pay ourselves what to ourselves is debt : 
What to ourselves in passion we propose, 
The passion ending, doth the purpose lose. 
The violence of either grief or joy 
Their own enactures with themselves destroy : 
Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament; 
Grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident. 
This world is not for aye, nor 't is not strange 
That even our loves should with our fortunes change ; 
For 't is a question left us yet to prove. 
Whether love lead fortune, or else fortune love. 
The great man down, you mark his favourite flies; 
The poor advanced makes friends of enemies. 
And hitherto doth love on fortune tend ; 
For who not needs shall never lack a friend, 
And who in want a hollow friend doth try. 
Directly seasons him his enemy. 

But, orderly to end where I begun, 220 

Our wills and fates do so contrary run 
That our devices still are overthrown; 
Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own: 
So think thou wik no second husband wed; 
But die thy thoughts when thy first lord is dead. 

P. Queen. Nor earth to me give food, nor heaven light ! 
Sport and repose lock from me day and night ! 
To desperation turn my trust and hope ! 
An anchor's cheer in prison be my scope ! 
Each opposite that blanks the face of joy 230 

Meet what I would have well and it destroy ! 
Both here and hence pursue me lasting strife, 
If, once a widow, ever I be wife ! 
Ham. If she should break it now ! 

P. King. 'Tis deeply sworn. Sweet, leave me here 
awhile ; 
My spirits grow dull, and fain I would beguile 
The tedious day with sleep. {Sleeps. 



76 HAMLET. [Act III. 

P. Queen. Sleep rock thy brain ; 

And never come mischance between us twain ! \Exit. 

Ham. Madam, how hke you this play? 

Quee?!. The lady doth protest too much, methinks, 240 

Ham. O, but she '11 keep her word. 

Ki7ig. Have you heard the argument? Is there no offence 
in't? 

Ham. No, no, they do but jest, poison in jest ; no offence 
i' the world. 

King. What do you call the play? 

Ham. The mouse-trap. Marry, how? Tropically. This 
play is the image of a murder done in Vienna: Gonzago is 
the duke's name; his wife, Baptista: you shall see anon; 'tis 
a knavish piece of work: but what o' that? your majesty 
and we that have free souls, it touches us not: let the galled 
jade wince, our withers are un wrung. 

Enter LuciANUS. 

This is one Lucianus, nephew to the king. 

Oph. You are as good as a chorus, my lord. 

Ham. I could interpret between you and your love, if I 
could see the puppets dallying. 

Oph. Still better, and worse. 261 

Ham. So you mistake your husbands. Begin, murderer; 
pox, leave thy damnable faces, and begin. Come : ' the 
croaking raven doth bellow for revenge '. 

Ltic. Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time 
agreeing ; 

Confederate season, else no creature seeing; 

Thou mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected, 

With Hecate's ban thrice blasted, thrice infected, 

Thy natural magic and dire property, 270 

On wholesome life usurp immediately. 

\Pou7's the poison i?tta the sleeper's ears. 

Ham. He poisons him i' the garden for's estate. His 
name's Gonzago: the story is extant, and writ in choice 
Italian: you shall see anon how the murderer gets the love 
of Gonzago's wife. 

Oph. The king rises. 

Hajn. What, frighted with false fire ! 

Quee7t. How fares my lord? 

Pol. Give o'er the play. 

King. Give me some light : away ! 280 

All. Lights, lights, lights ! 

[Exeunt all but Hamlet and Horatio. 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 77 

Ham. Why, let the stricken deer go weep, 
The hart ungalled play; 
For some must watch, while some must sleep: 
So runs the world away. 
Would not this, sir, and a forest of feathers — if the rest of 
my fortunes turn Turk with me — with two Provincial roses 
on my razed shoes, get me a fellowship in a cry of players, 
sir? 

Hor. Half a share. 290 

Ham. A whole one, I. 

For thou dost know, O Damon dear, 

This realm dismantled was 
Of Jove himself ; and now reigns here 
A very, very — pajock. 
Hor. You might have rhymed. 

Ham. O good Horatio, I '11 take the ghost's word for a 
thousand pound. Didst perceive? 
Hor. Very well, my lord. 

Ham. Upon the talk of the poisoning? 300 

Hor. I did very well note him. 

Ham. Ah, ha ! Come, some music ! come, the recorders ! 
For if the king like not the comedy. 
Why then, belike, he likes it not, perdy. 
Come, some music ! 

Re-enter ROSENCRANTZ and GuiLDENSTERN. 

Guil. Good my lord, vouchsafe me a word with you. 

Ham. Sir, a whole history. 

Guil. The king, sir, — 310 

Ham. Ay, sir, what of him ? 

Guil. Is in his retirement marvellous distempered. 

Ham. With drink, sir? 

Guil. No, my lord, rather with choler. 

Ham. Your wisdom should show itself more richer to 
signify this to his doctor; for, for me to put him to his purga- 
tion would perhaps plunge him into far more choler. 319 

Guil. Good my lord, put your discourse into some frame, 
and start not so wildly from my affair. 

Ham. I am tame, sir : pronounce. 

Guil. The queen, your mother, in most great affliction of 
spirit, hath sent me to you. 

Ham. You are welcome. 

Guil. Nay, good my lord, this courtesy is not of the right 
breed. If it shall please you to make me a w^holesome 



78 HAMLET. [Act III. 

answer, I will do your mother's commandment : if not, 
your pardon and my return shall be the end of my business. 

Ham. Sir, I cannot. 331 

Guil. What, my lord? 

Ham. Make you a wholesome answer; my wit's diseased: 
but, sir, such answer as I can make, you shall command ; or, 
rather, as you say, my mother : therefore no more, but to the 
matter: my mother, you say, — 

Ros. Then thus she says ; your behaviour hath struck her 
into amazement and admiration. 339 

Ha7n. O wonderful son, that can so astonish a mother! 
But is there no sequel at the heels of this mother's admira- 
tion? Impart. 

Ros. She desires to speak with you in her closet, ere you 
go to bed. 

Ham. We shall obey, were she ten times our mother. 
Have you any further trade with us? 

Ros. My lord, you once did love me. 

Ham. So I do still, by these pickers and stealers. 349 

Ros. Good my lord, what is your cause of distemper? you 
do, surely, bar the door upon your own liberty, if you deny 
your griefs to your friend. 

Ham. Sir, I lack advancement. 

Ros. How can that be, when you have the voice of the 
king himself for your succession in Denmark? 

Ha7n. Ay, sir, but, ' While the grass grows ',- — the proverb 
is something musty. 359 

Re-enter Players with recorders. 

O, the recorders ! let me see one. To withdraw with you : — 
why do you go about to recover the wind of me, as if you 
would drive me into a toil? 

Guil. O, my lord, if my duty be too bold, my love is too 
unmannerly. 

Ham. I do not well understand that. Will you play upon 
this pipe? 

Guil. My lord, I cannot. 

Ham. I pray you. 

Guil. Believe me, I cannot. 

Ham. I do beseech you. 370 

Guil. I know no touch of it, my lord. 

Ham. 'T is as easy as lying : govern these ventages with 
your fingers and thumb, give it breath with your mouth, and 
it will discourse most eloquent music. Look you, these are 
the stops. 



Scene 3.] HAMLET. 79 

Guil. But these cannot I command to any utterance of 
harmony; I have not the skill. 

Hani. Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you 
make of me ! You would play upon me ; you would seem to 
know my stops ; you would pluck out the heart of my mys- 
tery; you would "sound me from my lowest note to the top 
of my compass : and there is much music, excellent voice, in 
this little organ ; yet cannot you make it speak. 'Sblood, do 
you think I am easier to be played on than a pipe? Call me 
what instrument you will, though you can fret me, yet you 
cannot play upon me. 

Enter PoLONius. 
God bless you, sir ! 390 

Pol. My lord, the queen would speak with you, and 
presently. 

Ham. Do you see yonder cloud that's almost in shape of a 
camel? 

Pol. By the mass, and 't is like a camel, indeed. 

Ham. Methinks it is like a weasel. 

Pol. It is backed like a weasel. 

Ham. Or like a whale? 

Pol. Very like a whale. 399 

Ham. Then I will come to my mother by and by. They 
fool me to the top of my bent. I will come by and by. 

Pol. I will say so. 

Ham. By and by is easily said. \E,xit Polonius7\ Leave 
me, friends. [Exeunt all but Hafnlet. 

'T is now the very witching time of night. 
When churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out 
Contagion to this world : now could I drink hot blood. 
And do such bitter business as the day 
Would quake to look on. Soft! now to my mother. 410 

heart, lose not thy nature ; let not ever 
The soul of Nero enter this firm bosom : 
Let me be cruel, not unnatural : 

1 will speak daggers to her, but use none ; 
My tongue and soul in this be hypocrites ; 
How in my words soever she be shent. 

To give them seals never, my soul, consent ! [Exit. 

Scene in. A room in the castle. 
Enter King, Rosencrantz, and Guild enstern. 

King. I like him not, nor stands it safe with us 
To let his madness range. Therefore prepare you; 



8o HAMLET. [Act III. 

I your commission will forthwith dispatch, 
x\nd he to England shall along with you : 
The terms of our estate may not endure 
Hazard so near us as doth hourly grow 
Out of his lunacies. 

Gidl. We will ourselves provide : 

Most holy and religious fear it is 
To keep those many many bodies safe 
That live and feed upon your majesty. lo 

Ros. The single and peculiar life is bound, 
With all the strength and armour of the mind. 
To keep itself from noyance ; but much more 
That spirit upon whose weal depend and rest 
The lives of many. The cease of majesty 
Dies not alone ; but, like a gulf, doth draw 
What's near it with it : it is a massy wheel, 
Fix'd on the summit of the highest mount. 
To whose huge spokes ten thousand lesser things 
Are mortised and adjoin'd ; which, when it falls, 20 

Each small annexment, petty consequence, 
Attends the boisterous ruin. Never alone 
Did the king sigh, but with a general groan. 

King. Arm you, I pray you, to this speedy voyage; 
For we will fetters put upon this fear. 
Which now goes too free-footed. 

We will haste us. 



Guil. ^ 

[Exeunt Rosejicrantz and Guildenstern. 

Enter POLONius. 

Pol. My lord, he's going to his mothei^'s closet: 
Behind the arras I '11 convey myself. 
To hear the process ; I '11 warrant she '11 tax him home : 
And, as you said, and wisely was it said, 30 

'T is meet that some more audience than a mother. 
Since nature makes them partial, should o'erhear 
The speech, of vantage. Fare you well, my liege : 
I '11 call upon you ere you go to bed. 
And tell you what I know. 

King. Thanks, dear my lord. {Exit Polonius. 

O, my offence is rank, it smells to heaven ; 
It hath the primal eldest curse upon 't, 
A brother's murder. Pray can I not. 
Though inclination be as sharp as will : 
My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent ; 40 



Scene 3.] HAMLET. 81 

And, like a man to double business bound, 

I stand in pause where I shall first begin, 

And both neglect. What if this cursed hand 

Were thicker than itself with brother's blood, 

Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens 

To wash it white as snow? Whereto serves mercy 

But to confront the visage of offence? 

And what 's in prayer but this two-fold force, 

To be forestalled ere we come to fall, 

Or pardon'd being down? Then I '11 look up ; 50 

My fault is past. But, O, what form of prayer 

Can serve my turn? ' Forgive me my foul murder'? 

That cannot be ; since I am still possess'd 

Of those effects for which I did the murder, 

My crown, mine own ambition and my queen. 

May one be pardon'd and retain the offence? 

In the corrupted currents of this world 

Offence's gilded hand may shove by justice, 

And oft 't is seen the wicked prize itself 

Buys out the law : but 't is not so above ; 60 

There is no shuffling, there the action lies 

In his true nature ; and we ourselves compell'd. 

Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults. 

To give in evidence. What then? what rests? 

Try what repentance can : what can it not? 

Yet what can it when one can not repent? 

O wretched state ! O bosom black as death ! 

O limed soul, that, struggling to be free. 

Art more engaged ! Help, angels ! Make assay ! 

Bow, stubborn knees ; and, heart with strings of steel, 70 

Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe ! 

All may be well. {Retires and kneels. 

Enter Hamlet. 

Ham. Now might I do it pat, now he is praying ; 
And now I '11 do 't. And so he goes to heaven ; 
And so am I revenged. That would be scann'd : 
A villain kills my father ; and for that, 
I, his sole son, do this same villain send 
To heaven. 

O, this is hire and salary, not revenge. 

He took my father grossly, full of bread ; 80 

With all his crimes broad blown, as flush as May ; 
And how his audit stands who knows save heaven? 
But in our circumstance and course of thought, 

( 885 ) F 



82 HAMLET. [Act III. 

'T is heavy with him : and am I then revenged, 
To take him in the purging of his soul, 
When he is fit and season'd for his passage? 
No! 

Up, sword; and know thou a more horrid hent : 
When he is drunk asleep, or in his rage, 
Or in the incestuous pleasure of his bed ; 90 

At gaming, swearing, or about some act 
That has no relish of salvation in 't ; 
Then trip him, that his heels may kick at heaven, 
And that his soul may be as damn'd and black 
As hell, whereto it goes. My mother stays : 
This physic but prolongs thy sickly days, \Exit. 

King. [Rising] My words fly up, my thoughts remain 
below : 
Words without thoughts never to heaven go. [Exit. 

Scene IV. The Queen^s closet. 
Enter QUEEN and POLONIUS. 

Pol. He will come straight. Look you lay home to him : 
Tell him his pranks have been too broad to bear with. 
And that your grace hath screen'd and stood between 
Much heat and him. I '11 silence me even here. 
Pray you, be round with him. 

Ham. [Within\ Mother, mother, mother! 

Queen. I '11 warrant you. 

Fear me not : withdraw, I hear him coming. 

[Polonius hides behind the arras. 

Enter Hamlet. 

Ham, Now, mother, what's the matter? 

Queen. Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended. 

Ha7n. Mother, you have my father much offended. 10 

Queen. Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue. 

Ham. Go, go, you question with a wicked tongue. 

Queen. Why, how now, Hamlet ! 

Ha7n. What's the matter now? 

Queen. Have you forgot me? 

Ham,. No, by the rood, not so : 

You are the queen, your husband's brother's wife ; 
And— would it were not so ! — you are my mother. 

Queen. Nay, then, I '11 set those to you that can speak. 



Scene 4.] HAMLET. 83 

Ham. Come, come, and sit you down ; you shall not budge; 
You go not till I set you up a glass 
Where you may see the inmost part of you. 20 

Queen. What wilt thou do? thou wilt not murder me? 
Help, help, ho ! 

Pol. [Behind'] What, ho ! help, help, help ! 

Ha7n. [Drawing] How now! a rat? Dead, for a ducat, 
dead ! {Makes a pass through the arras. 

Pol. [Behind] O, I am slain ! [Falls and dies. 

Quee7i. O me, what hast thou done? 

Ham. Nay, I know not : 

Is it the king? 

Qiieeit. O, what a rash and bloody deed is this ! 

Ham. A bloody deed ! almost as bad, good mother. 
As kill a king, and marry with his brother. 

Queen. As kill a king ! 

Ham. Ay, lady, 't was my word. 30 

[Lifts up the arras a?td discovers Polonius. 
Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell ! 
I took thee for thy better : take thy fortune ; 
Thou find'st to be too busy is some danger. 
Leave wringing of your hands : peace ! sit you down, 
And let me wring your heart ; for so I shall. 
If it be made of penetrable stuff, 
If damned custom have not brass'd it so 
That it be proof and bulwark against sense. 

Queen. What have I done, that thou darest wag thy tongue 
In noise so rude against me? 

Ham. Such an act 40 

That blurs the grace and blush of modesty, 
Calls virtue hypocrite, takes off the rose 
From the fair forehead of an innocent love 
And sets a blister there, makes marriage-vows 
As false as dicers' oaths : O, such a deed 
As from the body of contraction plucks 
The very soul, and sweet religion makes 
A rhapsody of words : heaven's face doth glow ; 
Yea, this solidity and compound mass, 

With tristful visage, as against the doom, 50 

Is thought-sick at the act. 

Queen. Ay me, what act. 

That roars so loud, and thunders in the index? 

Ham. Look here, upon this picture, and on this, 
The counterfeit presentment of two brothers. 
See, what a grace was seated on this brow ; 



84 HAMLET. [Act III. 

Hyperion's curls ; the front of Jove himself; 

An eye like Mars, to threaten and command ; 

A station like the herald Mercury 

New-lighted on a heaven-kissing hill ; 

A combination and a form indeed, 60 

Where every god did seem to set his seal, 

To give the world assurance of a man : 

This was your husband. Look you now, what follows : 

Here is your husband ; like a mildew'd ear, 

Blasting his wholesome brother. Have you eyes? 

Could you on this fair mountain leave to feed, 

And batten on this moor? Ha! have you eyes? 

You cannot call it love ; for at your age 

The hey-day in the blood is tame, it 's humble. 

And waits upon the judgement : and what judgement 70 

Would step from this to this? Sense, sure, you have. 

Else could you not have motion ; but sure, that sense 

Is apoplex'd; for madness would not err. 

Nor sense to ecstasy was ne'er so thrall'd 

But it reserved some quantity of choice, 

To serve in such a difference. What devil was 't 

That thus hath cozen'd you at hoodman-blind? 

Eyes without feeling, feeling without sight. 

Ears without hands or eyes, smelling sans all. 

Or but a sickly part of one true sense 80 

Could not so mope. 

O shame! where is thy blush? Rebellious hell, 

If thou canst mutine in a matron's bones. 

To flaming youth let virtue be as wax, 

And melt in her own fire : proclaim no shame 

When the compulsive ardour gives the charge. 

Since frost itself as actively doth burn 

And reason pandars will. 

Quee7t. O Hamlet, speak no more : 

Thou turn'st mine eyes into my very soul ; 
And there I see such black and grained spots 90 

As will not leave their tinct. O, speak to me no more ; 
These words, like daggers, enter in mine ears ; 
No more, sweet Hamlet ! 

Ham. A murderer and a villain ; 

A slave that is not twentieth part the tithe 
Of your precedent lord ; a vice of kings ; 
A cutpurse of the empire and the rule, 

That from a shelf the precious diadem stole, 100 

And put it in his pocket ! / 



Scene 4.] HAMLET. 85 

Queen. No more ! 

Ham. A king of shreds and patches, — 

Enter Ghost. 

Save me, and hover o'er me with your wings. 

You heavenly guards ! What would your gracious figure 

Quee7i. Alas, he 's mad ! 

Ha7n. Do you not come your tardy son to chide, 
That, lapsed in time and passion, lets go by 
The important acting of your dread command? 
O, say! 

Ghost. Do not forget: this visitation no 

Is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose. 
But, look, amazement on thy mother sits : 
O, step between her and her fighting soul : 
Conceit in weakest bodies strongest works : 
Speak to her, Hamlet. 

Hain. How is it with you, lady? 

Qiieeii. Alas, how is 't with you, 
That you do bend your eye on vacancy 
And with the incorporal air do hold discourse? 
Forth at your eyes your spirits wildly peep ; 
And, as the sleeping soldiers in the alarm, 120 

Your bedded hair, like life in excrements, 
Start up, and stand an end. O gentle son, 
Upon the heat and flame of thy distemper 
Sprinkle cool patience. Whereon do you look? 

Ham. On him, on him ! Look you, how pale he glares ! 
His form and cause conjoin'd, preaching to stones, 
Would rnake them capable. Do not look upon me; 
Lest with this piteous action you convert 
My stern effects : then what I have to do 
Will want true colour ; tears perchance for blood. 1 30 

Queen. To whom do you speak this ? 

Ham. Do you see nothing there? 

Queen. Nothing at all ; yet all that is I see. 

Ham. Nor did you nothing hear? 

Queen. No, nothing but ourselves. 

Ham. Why, look you there ! look, how it steals away ! 
My father, in his habit as he lived ! 
Look, where he goes, even now, out at the portal ! 

\Exit Ghost. 

Queen. This is the very coinage of your brain : 
This bodiless creation ecstasy 
Is very cunning in. 



86 HAMLET. • [Act III. 

Ham, Ecstasy ! 

My pulse, as yours, doth temperately keep time, 140 

And makes as healthful music : it is not madness 
That I have utter'd : bring me to the test, 
And I the matter will re-word ; which madness 
Would gambol from. Mother, for love of grace, 
Lay not that flattering unction to your soul, 
That not your trespass, but my madness speaks : 
It will but skin and film the ulcerous place, 
Whiles rank corruption, mining all within. 
Infects unseen. Confess yourself to heaven ; 
Repent what 's past ; avoid what is to come ; 1 50 

And do not spread the compost on the weeds, 
To make them ranker. Forgive me this my virtue ; 
For in the fatness of these pursy times 
Virtue itself of vice must pardon beg, 
Yea, curb and woo for leave to do him good. 

Quee7i. O Hamlet, thou hast cleft my heart in twain. 

Ham. O, throw away the worser part of it. 
And live the purer with the other half 
Good night : but go not to mine uncle's bed ; 
Assume a virtue, if you have it not. 160 

That monster, custom, who all sense doth eat, 
Of habits devil, is angel yet in this, 
That to the use of actions fair and good 
He likewise gives a frock or livery, 
That aptly is put on. Refrain to-night, 
And that shall lend a kind of easiness 
To the next abstinence : the next more easy ; 
For use almost can change the stamp of nature. 

And either the devil, or throw him out 

With wondrous potency. Once more, good night : 170 

And when you are desirous to be bless'd, 

I '11 blessing beg of you. For this same lord, 

{Pointing to Polonius. 
I do repent : but heaven hath pleased it so. 
To punish me with this and this with me, 
That I must be their scourge and minister. 
I will bestow him, and will answer well 
The death I gave him. So, again, good night. 
I must be cruel, only to be kind : 
Thus bad begins and worse remains behind. 
One word more, good lady. 

Queen. What shall I do? 180 

Ham. Not this, by no means, that I bid you do : 



Scene 4.] 



HAMLET. 87 



Let the bloat king tempt you again to bed ; 

Pinch wanton on your cheek ; call you his mouse ; 

And let him, for a pair of reechy kisses. 

Or paddling in your neck with his damn'd fingers, 

Make you to ravel all this matter out. 

That I essentially am not in madness, 

But mad in craft. 'T were good you let him know 

For who, that 's but a queen, fair, sober, wise, 

Would from a paddock, from a bat, a gib, 1 9° 

Such dear concernings hide? who would do so? 

No, in despite of sense and secrecy. 

Unpeg the basket on the house's top. 

Let the birds fly, and, like the famous ape, 

To try conclusions, in the basket creep, 

And break your own neck down. 

Queen. Be thou assured, if words be made of breath, 
And breath of life, I have no life to breathe 
What thou hast said to me. 

Ham. I must to England; you know that? 

Queen. Alack, 200 

I had forgot : 't is so concluded on. 
Ham. There 's letters seal'd : and my two schoolfellows, 

Whom I will trust as I will adders fang'd. 

They bear the mandate ; they must sweep my way, 

And marshal me to knavery. Let it work ; 

For 't is the sport to have the enginer 

Hoist with his own petar: and 't shall go hard 

But I will delve one yard below their mines. 

And blow them at the moon : O, 't is most sweet, 

When in one line two crafts directly meet. 210 

This man shall set me packing : 

I '11 lug the guts into the neighbour room. 

Mother, good night. Indeed this counsellor 

Is now most still, most secret and most grave. 

Who was in life a foolish prating knave. 

Come, sir, to draw toward an end with you. 

Good night, mother. . . _ , . 

[Exeunt severally,- Hamlet dragging in Polomus. 



88 HAMLET. [Act IV. 

ACT IV. 

Scene I. A room in the castle. 

Enter King, Queen, Rosencrantz, aiid Guildenstern. 

King. There's matter in these sighs, these profound 
heaves : 
You must translate : 't is fit we understand them. 
Where is your son? 

Queen. Bestow this place on us a little while. 

\Exeunt Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. 
Ah, mine own lord, what have I seen to-night ! 

King. What, Gertrude? How does Hamlet? 

Queen. Mad as the sea and wind, when both contend 
Which is the mightier : in his lawless fit, 
Behind the arras hearing something stir, 
Whips out his rapier, cries, 'A rat, a rat !' lo 

And, in this brainish apprehension, kills 
The unseen good old man. 

King. O heavy deed ! 

It had been so with us, had we been there : 
His liberty is full of threats to all ; 
To you yourself, to us, to every one. 
Alas, how shall this bloody deed be answer'd? 
It will be laid to us, whose providence 
Should have kept short, restrain'd and out of haunt, 
This mad young man : but so much was our love. 
We would not understand what was most fit ; 20 

But, like the owner of a foul disease. 
To keep it from divulging, let it feed 
Even on the pith of life. Where is he gone? 

Queen. To draw apart the body he hath kill'd : 
O'er whom his very madness, like some ore 
Among a mineral of metals base. 
Shows itself pure ; he weeps for what is done. 

King. O Gertrude, come away ! 
The sun no sooner shall the mountains touch. 
But we will ship him hence : and this vile deed 30 

We must, with all our majesty and skill, 
Both countenance and excuse. Ho, Guildenstern I 

Re-enter ROSENCRANTZ a7ld GUILDENSTERN. 

Friends both, go join you with some further aid : 
Hamlet in madness hath Polonius slain. 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 8y 

And from his mother's closet hath he dragg'd him : 
Go seek him out ; speak fair, and bring the body 
Into the chapel. I pray you, haste in this. 

\Exeunt Roseticrantz and Guildenstern. 
Come, Gertrude, we '11 call up our wisest friends ; 
And let them know, both what we mean to do, 

And what 's untimely done 40 

Whose whisper o'er the world's diameter. 

As level as the cannon to his blank, 

Transports his poison'd shot, may miss our name. 

And hit the woundless air. O, come away ! 

My soul is full of discord and dismay. \Exeunt. 

Scene II. Another room i?t the castle. 
Enter Hamlet. 
Hani. Safely stowed. 

^uil\ \W^iJ^^^'\ Hamlet! Lord Hamlet! 
Ham. But soft, what noise? who calls on Hamlet? O, 
here they come. 

E7lter ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN. 

Ros. What have you done, my lord, with the dead body? 

Ham. Compounded it with dust, whereto 't is kin, 

Ros. Tell us where 't is, that we may take it thence 
And bear it to the. chapel. 

Hain. Do not believe it. 

Ros. Believe what? 10 

Ham. That I can keep your counsel and not mine own. 
Besides, to be demanded of a sponge ! what replication should 
be made by the son of a king? 

Ros. Take you me for a sponge, my lord ? 

Ha7n. Ay, sir, that soaks up the king's countenance, his 
rewards, his authorities. But such officers do the king best 
service in the end : he keeps them, like an ape, in the corner 
of his jaw; first mouthed, to be last swallowed: when he 
needs w^hat you have gleaned, it is but squeezing you, and, 
sponge, you shall be dry again. 

Ros. I understand you not, my lord. 

Ham. I am glad of it : a knavish speech sleeps in a foolish 
ear. 

Ros. My lord, you must tell us where the body is, and go 
with us to the king. 



90 HAMLET. [Act IV. 

Ham. The body is with the king, but the king is not with 
the body. The king is a thing — 30 

Guil. A thing, my lord ! 

Ham. Of nothing: bring me to him. Hide fox, and all 
after. \Exeu7it. 

Scene III. Ajiother room in the castle. 

Enter King, attended. 

King. I have sent to seek him, and to find the body. 
How dangerous is it that this man goes loose ! 
Yet must not we put the strong law on him : 
He's loved of the distracted multitude, 
Who like not in their judgement, but their eyes ; 
And where 't is so, the offender's scourge is weigh'd, 
But never the offence. To bear all smooth and even, 
This sudden sending him away must seem 
Deliberate pause : diseases desperate grown 
By desperate appliance are relieved, 10 

Or not at all. 

Enter Rosencrantz. 

How now ! what hath befall'n? 
Ros. Where the dead body is bestow'd, my lord, 
We cannot get from him. 

King. But where is he? 

Ros. Without, my lord ; guarded, to know your pleasure. 

King. Bring him before us, 

Ros. Ho, Guildenstern ! bring in my lord. 

Enter Hamlet and Guildenstern. 

King. Now, Hamlet, where 's Polonius? 

Ham. At supper. 

King. At supper ! where ? 1 9 

Ham. Not where he eats, but where he is eaten : a certain 
convocation of politic worms are e'en at him. Your worm is 
your only emperor for diet : we fat all creatures else to fat us, 
and we fat ourselves for maggots : your fat king and your 
lean beggar is but variable service, two dishes, but to one 
table : that 's the end. 

King. Alas, alas ! 

Ham. A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a 
king, and eat of the fish that hath fed of that worm. 30 



Scene 3.] HAMLET. 91 

King: What dost thou mean by this? 

Hmn. Nothing but to show you how a king may go a pro- 
gress through the guts of a beggar. 

Kmg. Where is Polonius? 

Ha77i. In heaven ; send thither to see : if your messenger 
find him not there, seek him i' the other place yourself But 
indeed, if you find him not within this month, you shall nose 
him as you go up the stairs into the lobby. 39 

King. Go seek him there. \To some Attendants. 

Ham. He will stay till you come. \Exeimt Attenda?tts. 

King. Hamlet, this deed, for thine especial safety, — 
Which we do tender, as we dearly grieve 
For that which thou hast done, — must send thee hence 
With fiery quickness: therefore prepare thyself; 
The bark is ready, and the wind at help, 
The associates tend, and every thing is bent 
For England. 

Ham. For England ! 

King. Ay, Hamlet. 

Ham. Good. 

King. So is it, if thou knew'st our purposes. 

Ham. I see a cherub that sees them. But, come; for Eng- 
land ! Farewell, dear mother. 5 1 

King. Thy loving father, Hamlet. 

Hun. My mother: father and mother is man and wife; 
man and wife is one flesh ; and so, my mother. Come, for 
England ! \Exit. 

King. Follow him at foot ; tempt him with speed aboard ; 
Delay it not; I '11 have him hence to-night: 
Away ! for every thing is seal'd and done 
That else leans on the affair : pray you, make haste. 

\_Exeti,nt Ro setter ant z a?id Guildenstern. 
And, England, if my love thou hold'st at aught — 
As my great power thereof may give thee sense, 
Since yet thy cicatrice looks raw and red 
After the Danish sword, and thy free awe 
Pays homage to us — thou mayst not coldly set 
Our sovereign process; which imports at full. 
By letters congruing to that effect. 
The present death of Hamlet. Do it, England: 
For like the hectic in my blood he rages, 
And thou must cure me: till I know 'tis done, 69 

Howe'er my haps, my joys were ne'er begun. \Exit. 



92 HAMLET. [Act IV. 

Scene IV. A plai7i in De?i7nark. 
Enter Fortinbras, a Captain, and Soldiers, marching. 

For. Go, captain, from me greet the Danish king ; 
Tell him that, by his license, Fortinbras 
Craves the conveyance of a promised march 
Over his kingdom. You know the rendezvous. 
If that his majesty would aught with us, 
We shall express our duty in his eye ; 
And let him know so. 

Cap. I will do 't, my lord. 

For. Go softly on. [Exeunt Fortinbras and Soldiers. 

Enter Hamlet, Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, a7id 

others. 

Ha7n. Good sir, whose powers are these? 

Cap. They are of Norway, sir. lo 

Ham. How purposed, sir, I pray you? 

Cap. Against some part of Poland. 

Ha7n. Who commands them, sir? 

Cap. The nephew to old Norway, Fortinbras. 

Ham. Goes it against the main of Poland, sir, 
Or for some frontier? 

Cap. Truly to speak, and with no addition. 
We go to gain a little patch of ground 
That hath in it no profit but the name. 

To pay five ducats, five, I would not farm it : 20 

Nor will it yield to Norway or the Pole 
A ranker rate, should it be sold in fee. 

Hajn. Why, then the Polack never will defend it. 

Cap. Yes, it is already garrison'd. 

Ham. Two thousand souls and twenty thousand ducats 
Will not debate the question of this straw: 
This is the imposthume of much wealth and peace, 
That inward breaks, and shows no cause without 
Why the man dies. I humbly thank you, sir. 

Cap. God be wi' you, sir. [Exit. 

Ros. Will 't please you go, my lord ? 

Ham. I '11 be with you straight. Go a little before. 31 

[Exeu7tt all except Hatnlet. 
How all occasions do inform against me, 
And spur my dull revenge ! What is a man. 
If his chief good and market of his time 
Be but to sleep and feed? a beast, no more. 



Scene 5.] 



HAMLET. 93 



Sure, he that made us with such large discourse, 

Looking before and after, gave us not 

That capability and god-like reason 

To fust in us unused. Now, whether it be 

Bestial obhvion, or some craven scruple 40 

Of thinking too precisely on the event, 

A thought which, quarter'd, hath but one part wisdom 

And ever three parts coward, I do not know 

Why yet I live to say ' This thing's to do'; 

Sith I have cause and will and strength and means 

To do't. Examples gross as earth exhort me: 

Witness this army of such mass and charge 

Led by a delicate and tender prince. 

Whose spirit with divine ambition puff d 

Makes mouths at the invisible event, 5° 

Exposing what is mortal and unsure 

To all that fortune, death and danger dare, 

Even for an egg-shell. Rightly to be great 

Is not to stir without great argument, 

But greatly to find quarrel in a straw 

When honour's at the stake. How stand 1 then, 

That have a father kill'd, a mother stam'd. 

Excitements of my reason and my blood, 

And let all sleep? while, to my shame, I see 

The imminent death of twenty thousand men, 00 

That, for a fantasy and trick of fame. 

Go to their graves like beds, fight for a plot 

Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause. 

Which is not tomb enough and continent 

To hide the slain? O, from this time forth 

My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth ! \pxit. 

Scene V. Ehinore. A room in the castle. 
Enter Queen, Horatio, and a Gentleman. 

Queen. I will not speak with her. 

Gent. She is importunate, indeed distract: 
Her mood will needs be pitied. , , , i. 5 

Queen What would she have? 

Gent. She speaks much of her father; says she hears 
There's tricks i' the world; and hems, and beats her heart; 
Spurns enviously at straws; speaks things m doubt. 
That carry but half sense: her speech is nothing. 
Yet the unshaped use of it doth move 



94 HAMLET. ' [Act IV. 

The hearers to collection; they aim at it, 
And botch the words up fit to their own thoQ^hts; lo 

Which, as her winks, and nods, and gestures' yield them, 
Indeed would make one think there might be thought, 
Though nothing sure, yet much unhappily. 

Hor. 'T were good she were spoken with ; for she may 
strew 
Dangerous conjectures in ill-breeding minds. 

Queen. Let her come in. \Exit Horatio. 

To my sick soul, as sin's true nature is, 
Each toy seems prologue to some great amiss: 
So full of artless jealousy is guilt, 
It spills itself in fearing to be spilt. 20 

Re-enter Horatio, with Ophelia. 

Oph. Where is the beauteous majesty of Denmark? 
Queen. How now, Ophelia ! 

Oph. \_Sings'\ How should I your true love know 
From another one? 
By his cockle hat and staff. 
And his sandal shoon. 
Queen. Alas, sweet lady, what imports this song? 
Oph. Say you? nay, pray you, mark. 
[vS/^^^] He is dead and gone, lady. 

He is dead and gone; 30 

At his head a grass-green turf, 
At his heels a stone. 
Queen. Nay, but, Ophelia, — 
Oph. Pray you, mark. 
\Sings\ White his shroud as the mountain snow, — 

Enter King. 

Queen. Alas, look here, my lord. 

Oph. \Sings^ Larded with sweet flowers; 
Which bewept to the grave did go 
With true-love showers. 

King. How do you, pretty lady? 40 

oph. Well, God dild you ! They say the owl was a baker's 
daughter. Lord, we know what we are, but know not what 
we may be. God be at your table ! 

King. Conceit upon her father. 

Oph. Pray you, let's have no words of this; but when they 
ask you what it means, say you this: 



Scene 5.] HAMLET. . 95 

[Siftgs] To-mqrrow is Saint Valentine's day, 
All in the morning betime, 
And I a maid at your window, 50 

To be your Valentine, 
Kmg. How long hath she been thus? 
Op/i. I hope all will be well. We must be patient: but I 
cannot choose but weep, to think they should lay him i' the 
cold ground. My brother shall know of it: and so I thank 
you for your good counsel. Come, my coach ! Good night, 
ladies ; good night, sweet ladies ; good night, good night. 

King. Follow her close; give her good watch, I pray you. 

\Exit Horatio. 
O, this is the poison of deep grief; it springs 
All from her father's death. O Gertrude, Gertrude, 
When sorrows come, they come not single spies. 
But in battalions. First, her father slain: 
Next, your son gone; and he most violent author 80 

Of his own just remove: the people muddied. 
Thick and unwholesome in their thoughts and whispers. 
For good Polonius' death; and we have done but greenly, 
In hugger-mugger to inter him: poor Opheha 
Divided from herself and her fair judgement. 
Without the which we are pictures, or mere beasts : 
Last, and as much containing as all these. 
Her brother is in secret come from France; 
Feeds on his wonder, keeps himself in clouds. 
And wants not buzzers to infect his ear 90 

With pestilent speeches of his father's death; 
Wherein necessity, of matter beggar' d. 
Will nothing stick our person to arraign 
In ear and ear. O my dear Gertrude, this, 
Like to a murdering-piece, in many places 
Gives me superfluous death. \_A noise within. 

Queen. Alack, what noise is this ? 

King. Where are my Switzers? Let them guard the door. 

Enter another Gentleman. 

What is the matter? 

Gent. Save yourself, my lord: 

The ocean, overpeering of his list, 

Eats not the flats with more impetuous haste 100 

Than young Laertes, in a riotous head, 
O'erbears your officers. The rabble call him lord; 
And, as the world were now but to begin. 



96 HAMLET. [Act IV. 

Antiquity forgot, custom not known, 

The ratifiers and props of every word, 

They cry ' Choose we: Laertes shall be king': 

Caps, hands, and tongues, applaud it to the clouds: 

' Laertes shall be king, Laertes king !' 

Quee?!. How cheerfully on the false trail they cry 1 
O, this is counter, you false Danish dogs ! i lo 

King. The doors are broke. \Noise within. 

Enter LAERTES, armed; T>2ir\Qs following. 

Laer. Where is this king? Sirs, stand you all without. 

Danes. No, let 's come in. 

Laer. I pray you, give me leave. 

Danes. We will, we will. \They retire without the door. 

Laer. I thank you: keep the door. O thou vile king, 
Give me my father ! 

Queen. Calmly, good Laertes. 

Laer. That drop of blood that 's calm proclaims me bas- 
tard. 
Cries cuckold to my father, brands the harlot 
Even here, between the chaste unsmirched brows 
Of my true mother. 

King. What is the cause, Laertes, 120 

That thy rebellion looks so giant-like? 
Let him go, Gertrude ; do not fear our person : 
There's such divinity doth hedge a king, 
That treason can but peep to what it would, 
Acts little of his will. Tell me, Laertes, 
Why thou art thus incensed. Let him go, Gertrude. 
Speak, man. 

Laer. Where is my father? 

King. Dead. 

Queen. But not by him. 

King. Let him demand his fill. 

Laer. How came he dead? I '11 not be juggled with: 130 
To hell, allegiance ! vows, to the blackest devil ! 
Conscience and grace, to the profoundest pit ! 
I dare damnation. To this point I stand. 
That both the worlds I give to negligence. 
Let come what comes ; only I '11 be revenged 
Most throughly for my father. 

King. Who shall stay you? 

Laer. My will, not all the world: 
And for my means, I '11 husband them so well, 
They shall go far with little. 



Scene 5.] HAMLET. 57 

King. Good Laertes, 

If you desire to know the certainty 140 

Of your dear father's death, is 't writ in your revenge, 
That, swoopstake, you will draw both friend and foe ' 
Winner and loser? ' 

Laer. None but his enemies. 

-p^^i^- Will you know them then? 

Laer. To his good friends thus wide I '11 ope my arms- 
And like the kind life-rendering pelican, ' 

Repast them with my blood, 

Ki7ig. Why, now you speak " 

Like a good child and a true gentleman. 
That 1 am guiltless of your father's death. 
And am most sensibly in grief for it, i cq 

It shall as level to your judgement pierce 
As day does to your eye. 

Danes. [ Within] Let her come in. 

Laer. How now! what noise is that? 

Re-enter Ophelia. 

O heat, dry up my brains ! tears seven times salt. 
Burn out the sense and virtue of mine eye ! 
By heaven, thy madness shall be paid with weight, 
Till our scale turn the beam. O rose of May ! 
Dear maid, kind sister, sweet Ophelia ! 
O heavens ! is 't possible, a young maid's wits 
Should be as mortal as an old man's life? 160 

Nature is fine in love, and where 't is fine. 
It sends some precious instance of itself ' 
After the thing it loves. 
Oph. \Sings\ 

They bore him barefaced on the bier ; 
Hey non nonny, nonny, hey nonny; 
And in his grave rain'd many a tear : — . 
Fare you well, my dove ! 

Laer. Hadst thou thy wits, and didst persuade revenge 
It could not move thus. ' 

Oph. {Sings\ You must sing a-down a-down. 

An you call him a-down-a. 171 

O, how the wheel becomes it ! It is the false steward, that 
stole his master's daughter. 

Laer. This nothing's more than matter. 
Oph. There's rosemary, that's for remembrance; pray, 
love, remember: and there is pansies, that's for thoughts 

(885) '^ 



98 HAMLET. [Act IV. 

Laer. A document in «madness, thoughts and remembrance 
fitted. 179 

Oph. There 's fennel for you, and columbines : there 's rue 
for you; and here's some for me: we may call it herb-grace 
o' Sundays: O, you must wear your rue with a difference. 
There's a daisy: I would give you some violets, but they 
withered all when my father died : they say he made a good 
end, — 

\Sings\ For bonny sweet Robin is all my joy. 
Laer. Thought and affliction, passion, hell itself, 
She turns to favour and to prettiness. 

Oph, \_Sings\ And will he not come again? 190 

And will he not come again? 
No, no, he is dead : 
Go to thy death-bed : 
He never will come again. 

His beard was as white as snow, 
' All flaxen was his poll : 

He is gone, he is gone, * 
And we cast away moan : 
God ha' mercy on his soul ! 
And of all Christian souls, I pray God. God be wi' ye. 

[Exit. 
Laer. Do you see this, O God? 201 

Kiiig. Laertes, I must commune with your grief. 
Or you deny me right. Go but apart. 
Make choice of whom your wisest friends you will. 
And they shall hear and judge 'twixt you and me: 
If by direct or by collateral hand 
They find us touch'd, we will our kingdom give, 
Our crown, our life, and all that we call ours, 
To you in satisfaction; but if not. 

Be you content to lend your patience to us, 210 

And we shall jointly labour with your soul 
To give it due content. 

Laer. Let this be so; 

His means of death, his obscure burial — 
No trophy, sword, nor hatchment o'er his bones, 
No noble rite nor formal ostentation — 
Cry to be heard, as 't were from heaven to earth, 
That I must call 't in question. 

King. So you shall ; 

And where the offence is let the great axe fall. 
I pray you, go with me. \ Exeunt. 



Scene 7 HAMLET. 99 

Scene VI. Another room in the castle. 
Enter Horatio and a Servant. 

Hor. What are they that would speak with me? 

Serv. Sea-faring men, sir: they say they have letters for 
you. 

Hor. Let them come in. \Exit servant. 

I do not know from what part of the world 
I should be greeted, if not from lord Hamlet. 

Enter Sailors. 

First Sailor. God bless you, sir. 

Hor. Let him bless thee too. 

First Sailor. He shall, sir, an 't please him. There 's a letter 
for you, sir; it comes from the ambassador that was bound 
for England ; if your name be Horatio, as I am let to know 
it is. 1 1 

Hor. \Reads~\ ' Horatio, when thou shalt have overlooked 
this, give these fellows some means to the king: they have 
letters for him. Ere we were two days old at sea, a pirate of 
very warlike appointment gave us chase. Finding ourselves 
too slow of sail, we put on a compelled valour, and in the 
grapple I boarded them: on the instant they got clear of our 
ship; so I alone became their prisoner. They have dealt 
with me like thieves of mercy: but they knew what they did; 
I am to do a good turn for them. Let the king have the 
letters I have sent ; and repair thou to me with as much speed 
as thou wouldst fly death. I have words to speak in thine 
ear will make thee dumb; yet are they much too light for 
the bore of the matter. These good fellows will bring thee 
where I am. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern hold their 
course for England : of them I have much to tell thee. Fare- 
well. 30 
' He that thou knowest thine, Hamlet.' 
Come, I will make you way for these your letters ; 
And do 't the speedier, that you may direct me 
To him from whom you brought them. [^Exeunt. 

Scene Vn. Another rooni iji the castle. 

Enter King and Laertes. 

King. Now must your conscience my acquittance seal, 
And you must put me in your heart for friend, 
Sith you have heard, and with a knowing ear, 
That he which hath your noble father slain 
Pursued my life. 



loo HAMLET. [Act IV. 

Laer. It well appears: but tell me 

Why you proceeded not against these feats, 
So crimeful and so capital in nature, 
As by your safety, wisdom, all things else, 
You mainly were stirr'd up. 

King. O, for two special reasons; 

Which may to you, perhaps, seem much unsinew'd, lo 

But yet to me they are strong. The queen his mother 
Lives almost by his looks ; and for myself — 
My virtue or my plague, be it either which — 
She 's so conjunctive to my life and soul. 
That, as the star moves not but in his sphere, 
I could not but by her. The other motive, 
Why to a public count I might not go, 
Is the great love the general gender bear him; 
Who, dipping all his faults in their affection. 
Would, like the spring that turneth wood to stone, 20 

Convert his gyves to graces; so that my arrows. 
Too slightly timber'd for so loud a wind, 
Would have reverted to my bow again. 
And not where I had aim'd them. 

Laer. And so have I a noble father lost ; 
A sister driven into desperate terms. 
Whose worth, if praises may go back again, 
Stood challenger on mount of all the age 
For her perfections: but my revenge will come. 

King. Break not your sleeps for that: you must not think 
That we are made of stuff so flat and dull 31 

That we can let our beard be shook with danger 
And think it pastime. You shortly shall hear more: 
I loved your father, and we love ourself ; 
And that, I hope, will teach you to imagine — 

Eiiter a Messenger. 

How now ! what news ? 

Mess. Letters, my lord, from Hamlet: 

This to your majesty; this to the queen. 

King. From Hamlet! who brought them? 

Mess. Sailors, my lord, they say; I saw them not: 
They were given me by Claudio; he received them 40 

Of him that brought them. 

King. Laertes, you shall hear them. 

Leave us. \Exit Messenger. 

[Reads'] ' High and mighty. You shall know I am set 
naked on your kingdom. To-morrow shall I beg leave to 



Scene 7.] HAMLET. loi 

see your kingly eyes: when I shall, first asking your pardon 
thereunto, recount the occasion of my sudden and more 
strange return. ' Hamlet.' 

What should this mean? Are all the rest come back? 50 
Or is it some abuse, and no such thing? 

Laer. Know you the hand? 

Ki?tg. 'T is Hamlet's character. 'Naked!' 

And in a postscript here, he says ' alone '. 
Can you advise me? 

Laer. I 'm lost in it, my lord. But let him come; 
It warms the very sickness in my heart, 
That I shall live and tell him to his teeth, 
' Thus didest thou'. 

King. If it be so, Laertes — 

As how should it be so? how otherwise? — - 
Will you be ruled by me? 

Laer. Ay, my lord; 60 

So you will not o'errule me to a peace. 

King. To thine own peace. If he be now return'd, 
As checking at his voyage, and that he means 
No more to undertake it, I will work him 
To an exploit, now ripe in my device, 
Under the which he shall not choose but fall: 
And for his death no wind of blame shall breathe. 
But even his mother shall uncharge the practice 
And call it accident. 

Laer. My lord, I will be ruled ; 

The rather, if you could devise it so 70 

That I might be the organ. 

King. It falls right. 

You have been talk'd of since your travel much. 
And that in Hamlet's hearing, for a quality 
Wherein, they say, you shine : your sum of parts 
Did not together pluck such envy from him 
As did that one, and that, in my regard, 
Of the unworthiest siege. 

Laer. What part is that, my lord? 

King. A very riband in the cap of youth. 
Yet needful too; for youth no less becomes 
The light and careless livery that it wears 80 

Than settled age his sables and his weeds, 
Importing health and graveness. Two months since. 
Here was a gentleman of Normandy : — 
I've seen myself, and served against, the French, 
And they can well on horseback: but this gallant 



I02 HAMLET. [Act IV. 

Had witchcraft in't; he grew unto his seat; 

And to such wondrous doing brought his horse, 

As had he been incorpsed and demi-natured 

With the brave beast : so far he topp'd my thought, 

That I, in forgery of shapes and tricks, 90 

Come short of what he did. 

Laer. A Norman was't? 

King. A Norman. 

Laer. Upon my Hfe, Lamond. 

Kiitg. The very same. 

Laer. I know him well : he is the brooch indeed 
And gem of all the nation. 

King. He made confession of you, 
And gave you such a masterly report 
For art and exercise in your defence 
And for your rapier most especial, 

That he cried out, 't would be a sight indeed, loo 

If one could match you : the scrimers of their nation, 
He swore, had neither motion, guard, nor eye 
If you opposed them. Sir, this report of his 
Did Hamlet so envenom with his envy 
That he could nothing do but wish and beg 
Your sudden coming o'er, to play with him. 
Now, out of this, — 

Laer. What out of this, my lord? 

King. Laertes, was your father dear to you? 
Or are you like the painting of a sorrow, 
A face without a heart? 

Laer. Why ask you this? no 

King. Not that I think you did not love your father; 
But that I know love is begun by time ; 
And that I see, in passages of proof, 
Time qualifies the spark and fire of it. 
There lives within the very flame of love 
A kind of wick or snuff that will abate it ; 
And nothing is at a like goodness still ; 
For goodness, growing to a plurisy, 
Dies in his own too much : that we v/ould do. 
We should do when we would ; for this 'would' changes 120 
And hath abatements and delays as many 
As there are tongues, are hands, are accidents ; 
And then this ' should ' is like a spendthrift's sigh. 
That hurts by easing. But, to the quick o' the ulcer : — 
Hamlet comes back : what would you undertake, 
To show yourself your father's son in deed 



Scene 7.] HAMLET. 103 

More than in words? 

Laer. To cut his throat i' the church. 

Ki7ig. No place, indeed, should murder sanctuarize ; 
Revenge should have no bounds. But, good Laertes, 
Will you do this, keep close within your chamber. 130 

Hamlet return'd shall know you are come home : 
We '11 put on those shall praise your excellence 
And set a double varnish on the fame 
The Frenchman gave you, bring you in fine together 
And wager on your heads : he, being remiss, 
Most generous and free from all contriving, 
Will not peruse the foils ; so that, with ease, 
Or with a little shuffling, you may choose 
A sword unbated, and in a pass of practice 
Requite him for your father. 

Laer. I will do 't : 140 

And, for that purpose, I '11 anoint my sword. 
I bought an unction of a mountebank, 
So mortal that, but dip a knife in it. 
Where it draws blood no cataplasm so rare. 
Collected from all simples that have virtue 
Under the moon, can save the thing from death 
That is but scratch'd withal : I '11 touch my point 
With this contagion, that, if I gall him slightly. 
It may be death. 

King. Let 's further think of this ; 

Weigh what convenience both of time and means 1 50 

May fit us to our shape : if this should fail, 
And that our drift look through our bad performance, 
'T were better not assay'd : therefore this project 
Should have a back or second, that might hold. 
If this should blast in proof Soft ! let me see : 
We '11 make a solemn wager on your cunnings : 
Iha't: 

When in your motion you are hot and dry — 
As make your bouts more violent to that end — 
And that he calls for drink, I '11 have prepared him 160 

A chalice for the nonce, whereon but sipping, 
If he by chance escape your venom'd stuck, 
Our purpose may hold there. 

Enter Queen. 

How now, sweet queen ! 
Queen. One woe doth tread upon another's heel, 
So fast they follow : your sister 's drown'd, Laertes. 



I04 HAMLET. [Act V. 

Laer. Drown'd! O, where? 

Queen. There is a willow grows aslant a brook, 
That shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream ; 
There with fantastic garlands did she come 
Of crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples 170 

That liberal shepherds give a grosser name. 
But our cold maids do dead men's fingers call them : 
There, on the pendent boughs her coronet weeds 
Clambering to hang, an envious sliver broke ; 
When down her weedy trophies and herself 
Fell in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread wide; 
And, mermaid-like, awhile they bore her up : 
Which time she chanted snatches of old tunes ; 
As one incapable of her own distress. 

Or like a creature native and indued 180 

Unto that element : but long it could not be 
Till that her garments, heavy with their drink, 
Pull'd the poor wretch from her melodious lay 
To muddy death. 

Laer. Alas, then, she is drown'd? 

Queen. Drown'd, drown'd. 

Laer. Too much of water hast thou, poor Ophelia, 
And therefore I forbid my tears : but yet 
It is our trick; nature her custom holds. 
Let shame say what it will : when these are gone, 
The woman will be out. Adieu, my lord: 190 

I have a speech of fire, that fain would blaze, 
But that this folly douts it. \Exit. 

Kiiig. Let 's follow, Gertrude : 

How much I had to do to calm his rage ! 
Now fear I this will give it start again ; 
Therefore let 's follow. [Exeunt 



ACT V. 

Scene I. A churchyard. 
Enter two Clowns, with spades., &^c. 

First Clo. Is she to be buried in Christian burial that wil- 
fully seeks her own salvation? 

Sec. Clo. I tell thee she is : and therefore make her grave 
straight : the crowner hath sat on her, and finds it Christian 
burial. 



Scene i.] HAMLET. 105 

First Clo. How can that be, unless she drowned herself in 
her own defence ? 

Sec. Clo. Why, 't is found so. 

First Clo. It must be 'se offendendo'; it cannot be else. 
For here lies the point : if I drown myself wittingdy, it argues 
an act : and an act hath three branches ; it is, to act, to do, 
and to perform : argal, she drowned herself wittingly. 

Sec. Clo. Nay, but hear you, goodman delver, — 

First Clo. Give me leave. Here lies the water; good: here 
stands the man; good: if the man go to this water, and 
drown himself, it is, will he, nill he, he goes, — mark you that; 
but if the water come to him and drown him, he drowns not 
himself: argal, he that is not guilty of his own death shortens 
not his own life. 

Sec. Clo. But is this law? 

First Clo. Ay, marry, is 't ; crowner's quest law. 

Sec. Clo. Will you ha' the truth on 't? If this had not been 
a gentlewoman, she should have been buried out o' Christian 
burial. 

First Clo. Why, there thou say'st : and the more pity that 
great folk should have countenance in this world to drown or 
hang themselves, more than their even Christian. Come, my 
spade. There is no ancient gentlemen but gardeners, ditchers, 
and grave-makers : they hold up Adam's profession. 

Sec. Clo. Was he a gentleman? 

First Clo. 'A was the first that ever bore arms. 

Sec. Clo. Why, he had none. 39 

First Clo. What, art a heathen? How dost thou under- 
stand the Scripture? The Scripture says 'Adam digged': 
could he dig without arms ? I '11 put another question to 
thee : if thou answerest me not to the purpose, confess thy- 
self— 

Sec. Clo. Go to. 

First Clo. What is he that builds stronger than either the 
mason, the shipwright, or the carpenter? 

Sec. Clo. The gallows-maker; for that frame outlives a 
thousand tenants. 5° 

First Clo. I like thy wit well, in good faith : the gallows 
does well ; but how does it well? it does well to those who do 
ill : now thou dost ill to say the gallows is built stronger than 
the church: argal, the gallows may do well to thee. To't 
again, come. 

Sec. Clo. ' Who builds stronger than a mason, a shipwright, 
or a carpenter?' 

First Clo. Ay, tell me that, and unyoke. 



io6 HAMLET. [Act V. 

Sec. Clo. Marry, now I can tell. 60 

First Clo. To't. 

Sec. Clo. Mass, I cannot tell. 

Enter Hamlet atid Horatio, at a distance. 

First Clo. Cudgel thy brains no more about it, for your 
dull ass will not mend his pace with beating ; and, when you 
are asked this question next, say ' a grave-maker^ : the houses 
that he makes last till doomsday. Go, get thee to Yaughan: 
fetch me a stoup of liquor. \Exit Sec. Clown. 

[He digs, and sings. 

In youth, when I did love, did love, 

Methought it was very sweet, . 70 

To contract, O, the time, for, ah, my behove, 

O, methought, there was nothing meet. 

Ham. Has this fellow no feeling of his business, that he 
sings at grave-making? 

Hor. Custom hath made it in him a property of easiness. 
Ham. 'T is e'en so : the hand of little employment hath the 
daintier sense. 

Fi7-st Clo. [Sings] 

But age, with his stealing steps 

Hath claw'd me in his clutch, 80 

And hath shipped me intil the land. 
As if I had never been such. 

\Throws up a skull. 

Ham. That skull had a tongue in it, and could sing once : 
how the knave jowls it to the ground, as if it were Cain's jaw- 
bone, that did the first murder ! It might be the pate of a 
politician, which this ass now o'er-reaches ; one that would 
circumvent God, might it not? 

Hor. It might, my lord. 89 

Ham. Or of a courtier : which could say ' Good morrow, 
sweet lord! How dost thou, good lord?' This might be my 
lord such-a-one,that praised my lord such-a-one's horse, when 
he meant to beg it ; might it not? 

Hor. Ay, my lord. 

Hajn. Why, e'en so : and now my Lady Worm's ; chapless, 
and knocked about the mazzard with a sexton's spade : here 's 
fine revolution, an we had the trick to see 't. Did these bones 
cost no more the breeding, but to play at loggats with 'em? 
mine ache to think on 't. loi 



Scene i.] HAMLET. 107 

First Clo. \Sings\ 

A pick-axe, and a spade, a spade, 

For and a shrouding sheet : 
O, a pit of clay for to be made 
For such a guest is meet. 

{^Throws up another skull. 

Ham. There 's another : why may not that be the skull of 
a lawyer? Where be his quiddities now, his quillets, his cases, 
his tenures, and his tricks.? why does he suffer this rude knave 
now to knock him about the sconce with a dirty shovel, and 
will not tell him of his action of battery? Hum! This fellow 
might be in 's time a great buyer of land, with his statutes, his 
recognizances, his fines, his double vouchers, his recoveries : 
is this the fine of his fines, and the recovery of his recoveries, 
to have his fine pate full of fine dirt? will his vouchers vouch 
him no more of his purchases, and double ones too, than the 
length and breadth of a pair of indentures? The very con- 
veyances of his lands will hardly lie in this box ; and must 
the inheritor himself have no more, ha? 

Hor. Not a jot more, my lord. 

Hajn. Is not parchment made of sheep-skins? 

Hor. Ay, my lord, and of calf-skins too. 

Ham. They are sheep and calves which seek out assurance 
in that. I will speak to this fellow. Whose grave's this, 
sirrah ? 

First Clo. Mine, sir. 

[Sings'] O, a pit of clay for to be made 

For such a guest is meet. 1 30 

Ham. I think it be thine, indeed ; for thou lies-t in 't. 

First Clo. You lie out on't, sir, and therefore it is not 
yours : for my part, I do not lie in 't, and yet it is mine. 

Ham. Thou dost lie in 't, to be in 't and say it is thine : 't is 
for the dead, not for the quick ; therefore thou liest. 

First Clo. 'T is a quick lie, sir ; 't will away again, from me 
to you. 140 

Ham. What man dost thou dig it for? 

First Clo. For no man, sir. 

Ham. What woman, then? 

First Clo. For none, neither. 

Ham. Who is to be buried in't? ' 

First Clo. One that was a woman, sir ; but, rest her soul, 
she's dead, 

Ha7n. How absolute the knave is ! we must speak by the 
card, or equivocation will undo us. By the Lord, Horatio, 
these three years I have taken note of it ; the age is grown 



io8 HAMLET. [Act V. 

so picked that the toe of the peasant comes so near the heel 
of the courtier, he galls his kibe. How long hast thou been 
a grave-maker? 

First Clo. Of all the days i' the year, I came to 't that day 
that our last king Hamlet overcame Fortinbras. 

Ham. How long is that since? 

First Clo. Cannot you tell that? every fool can tell that: 
it was the very day that young Hamlet was born ; he that is 
mad, and sent into England. 

Ham. Ay, marry, why was he sent into England? 

First Clo. Why, because he was mad : he shall recover his 
wits there ; or, if he do not, it 's no great matter there. 

Ham. Why? 

First Clo. 'Twill not be seen in him there; there the men 
are as mad as he. 170 

Ham. How came he mad? 

First Clo. Very strangely, they say. 

Ham. How strangely? 

First Clo. Faith, e'en with losing his wits. 

Ham. Upon what ground? 

First Clo. Why, here in Denmark: I have been sexton 
here, man and boy, thirty years. 

Ham. How long will a man lie i' the earth ere he rot? 179 

First Clo. r faith, if he be not rotten before he die, he 
will last you some eight year or nine year : a tanner will last 
you nine year. 

Ha?n. Why he more than another? 

First Clo. Why, sir, his hide is so tanned with his trade, 
that he will keep out water a great while ; and your water is 
a sore decayer of your dead body. Here's a skull now; this 
skull has lain in the earth three and twenty years. 191 

Ha?n. Whose was it? 

First Clo. A mad fellow's it was : whose do you think it 
was? 

Ham. Nay, I know not. 

First Clo. A pestilence on him for a mad rogue ! a' poured 
a flagon of Rhenish on my head once. This same skull, sir, 
was Yorick's skull, the king's jester. 

Ham. This? 200 

First Clo. E'en that. 

Ham. Let me see. \Takes the skulF\ 

Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow of infinite 
jest, of most excellent fancy : he hath borne me on his back 
a thousand times ; and now, how abhorred in my imagina- 
tion it is ! my gorge rises at it. Here hung those lips that I 



Scene i.J HAMLT^T. 109 

have kissed I know not how oft. Where be your gibes now? 
your gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment, that 
were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one now, to mock 
your own grinning? quite chap-fallen? Now get you to my 
lady's chamber, and tell her, let her paint an inch thick, to 
this favour she must come ; make her laugh at that. Prithee, 
Horatio, tell me one thing. 

Hor. What 's that, my lord ? 

Ham. Dost thou think Alexander looked o' this fashion 
i' the earth? 

Hor. E'en so. 220 

Ham. And smelt so? pah! \Piits down the skull. 

Hor. E'en so, my lord. 

Ham. To what base uses we may return, Horatio ! Why 
may not imagination trace the noble dust of Alexander, till 
he find it stopping a bung-hole? 

Hor. 'T were to consider too curiously, to consider so. 

Ham. No, faith, not a jot; but to follow him thither with 
modesty enough, and likelihood to lead it : as thus : Alex- 
ander died, Alexander was buried, Alexander returneth into 
dust; the dust is earth; of earth we make loam; and why of 
that loam, whereto he was converted, might they not stop a 
beer-barrel ? 

Imperious Caesar, dead and turn'd to clay, 
Might stop a hole to keep the wind away : 
O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe, 
Should patch a wall to expel the winter's flaw ! 
But soft ! but soft ! aside : here comes the king, 

E7tter Priests, &^c. in procession; the Corpse of OPHELIA, 
Laertes and Mourners followingj King, Queen, their 
trains., &^c. 

The queen, the courtiers: who is this they follow? 

And with such maimed rites? This doth betoken 

The corse they follow did with desperate hand 

Fordo it own life : 't was of some estate. 

Couch we awhile, and mark. SJR.etiring with Horatio. 

Laer. What ceremony else? 

Ham. That is Laertes, 

A very noble youth : mark. 

Laer. What ceremony else? 

First Priest. Her obsequies have been as far enlarged 
As we have warranty : her death was doubtful ; 250 

And, but that great command o'ersways the order, 
She should in ground unsanctified have lodged 



T-T \ A "■ T, T-< rT^ 

iio HAMLii^T. [Act V. 

Till the last trumpet ; for charitable prayers, 
Shards, flints and pebbles should be thrown on her : 
Yet here she is allow'd her virgin crants, 
Her maiden strewments and the bringing home 
Of bell and burial. 

Laer. Must there no more be done? 

Fi'rs^ Priest. No more be done : 

We should profane the service of the dead 
To sing a requiem and such rest to her 260 

As to peace-parted souls. 

Laer. Lay her i' the earth : 

And from her fair and unpolluted flesh 
May violets spring I I tell thee, churlish priest, 
A ministering angel shall my sister be, 
When thou liest howling. 

Ham. What, the fair Ophelia I 

Queen. Sweets to the sweet : farewell ! [Scattering flowers. 
I hoped thou shouldst have been my Hamlet's wife ; 
I thought thy bride-bed to have deck'd, sweet maid. 
And not have strew'd thy grave. 

Laer. O, treble woe 

Fall ten times treble on that cursed head, 270 

Whose wicked deed thy most ingenious sense 
Deprived thee of! Hold ofl'the earth awhile, 
Till I have caught her once more in mine arms : 

[Leaps into the grave. 
Now pile your dust upon the quick and dead. 
Till of this flat a mountain you have made. 
To o'ertop old Pelion, or the skyish head 
Of blue Olympus. 

Hani. [Advancing^ What is he whose grief 
Bears such an emphasis? whose phrase of sorrow 
Conjures the wandering stars, and makes them stand 
Like wonder- wounded heroes? This is I, 280 

Hamlet the Dane. [Leaps into the grave. 

Laer. The devil take thy soul ! 

[Grappling with him. 

Ham. Thou pray'st not well. 
I prithee, take thy fingers from my throat ; 
For, though I am not splenitive and rash, 
Yet have I something in me dangerous. 
Which let thy wiseness fear : hold off thy hand. 

King. Pluck them asunder. 

Queen. Hamlet, Hamlet! 

All. Gentlemen, — 



Scene i.] HAMLET. in 

Hor. Good my lord, be quiet. 

\The Attendants part tke?n, and they come out of the 
' ■•• - ■ " - ■' grave. 

Hani. Why, I will fight with him upon this theme 
Until my eyelids will no longer wag. 290 

Queeti. O my son, what theme? 

Ham. I loved Ophelia : forty thousand brothers 
Could not, with all their quantity of love, 
Make up my sum. What wilt thou do for her? 

King. O, he is mad, Laertes. 

Queen. For love of God, forbear him. 

Ham. 'S wounds, show me what thou 'It do : 
Woo't weep? woo't fight? woo't fast? woo't tear thyself? 
Woo't drink up eisel? eat a crocodile? 

I '11 do 't. Dost thou come here to whine? 300 

To outface me with leaping in her grave? 
Be buried quick with her, and so will I : 
And, if thou prate of mountains, let them throw 
Millions of acres on us, till our ground, 
Singeing his pate against the burning zone. 
Make Ossa like a wart ! Nay, an thou 'It mouth, 
1 '11 rant as well as thou. 

Queen. This is mere madness : 

And thus awhile the fit will work on him ; 
Anon, as patient as the female dove, 

When that her golden couplets are disclosed, 310 

His silence will sit drooping. 

Ham. Hear you, sir; 

What is the reason that you use me thus? 
I loved you ever : but it is no matter ; 
Let Hercules himself do what he may, 
The cat will mew and dog will have his day. {Exit. 

King. I pray you, good Horatio, wait upon him. 

\Exit Horatio. 
[To Laertes] Strengthen your patience in our last night's 

speech ; 
We '11 put the matter to the present push. 
Good Gertrude, set some watch over your son. 
This grave shall have a living monument : 320 

An hour of quiet shortly shall we see ; 
Till then, in patience our proceeding be. [Exeunt. 



112 HAMLET. r^Act V. 

ScenI^, II. A hall ill the castle- 
Enter liAl.lLST 2^^-^ ■Hors.ATlo. 

Ham. So much for this, sir : now shall you see the other ; 
You do remember all the circumstance? 

Hor. Remember it, my lord ! 

Ham. Sir, in my heart there was a kind of fighting, 
That would not let me sleep : methought I lay 
Worse than the mutines in the bilboes. Rashly — 
And praised be rashness for it, let us know, 
Our indiscretion sometimes serves us well, 
When our deep plots do pall : and that should teach us 
There 's a divinity that shapes our ends, lo 

Rough-hew them how we will, — 

Hor. That is most certain. 

Ham. — Up from my cabin. 
My sea-gown scarf'd about me, in the dark 
Groped I to find out them ; had my desire, 
Finger'd their packet, and in fine withdrew 
To mine own room again ; making so bold, 
My fears forgetting manners, to unseal 
Their grand commission ; where I found, Horatio, — 

royal knavery ! — an exact command, 

Larded with many several sorts of reasons 20 

Importing Denmark's health and England's too, 

With, ho ! such bugs and goblins in my life, 

That, on the supervise, no leisure bated. 

No, not to stay the grinding of the axe. 

My head should be struck off. 

Hor. Is't possible? 

Ham. Here's the commission: read it at more leisure. 
But wilt thou hear me how I did proceed? 

Hor. I beseech you. 

Hajn. Being thus be-netted round with villanies, — 
Ere I could make a prologue to my brains, 30 

They had begun the play — I sat me down. 
Devised a new commission, wrote it fair: 

1 once did hold it, as our statists do, 

A baseness to write fair and labour'd much 
How to forget that learning, but, sir, now 
It did me yeoman's service: wilt thou know 
The effect of what I wrote? 

Hon Ay, good my lord. 

Ham. An earnest conjuration from the king, 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 113 

As England was his faithful tributary, 

As love between them like the palm might flourish, 40 

As peace should still her wheaten garland wear 

And stand a comma 'tween their amities, 

And many such-like 'As 'es of great charge, 

That, on the view and knowing of these contents-, 

Without debatement further, more or less, 

He should the bearers put to sudden death, 

Not shriving-time allow'd. 

Hor. How was this seal'd? 

Ham. Why, even in that was heaven ordinant. 
I had my father's signet in my purse, 

Which was the model of that Danish seal; 50 

Folded the writ up in form of the other, 
Subscribed it, gave't the impression, placed it safely, 
The changeling never known. Now, the next day 
Was our sea-fight; and what to this was sequent 
Thou know'st already. 

Hor. So Guildenstern and Rosencrantz go to 't. 

Hmn. Why, man, they did make love to this employment; 
They are not near my conscience; their defeat 
Does by their own insinuation grow: 

'T is dangerous when the baser nature comes 60 

Between the pass and fell incensed points 
Of mighty opposites. 

Hor. Why, what a king is this ! 

Hani. Does it not, think'st thee, stand me now upon — 
He that hath kill'd my king and whored my mother, 
Popp'd in between the election and my hopes, 
Thrown out his angle for my proper life. 
And with such cozenage — is 't not perfect conscience. 
To quit him with this arm? and is't not to be damn'd. 
To let this canker of our nature come 
In further evil? 70 

Hor. It must be shortly known to him from England 
What is the issue of the business there. 

Ham. It will be short: the interim is mine; 
And a man's life 's no more than to say ' One '. 
But I am very sorry, good Horatio, 
That to Laertes I forgot myself; 
For, by the image of my cause, I see 
The portraiture of his: I '11 court his favour: 
But, sure, the bravery of his grief did put me 
Into a towering passion. 

Hor. Peace! who comes here? 80 

(885) H 



114 HAMLET. [Act V. 

Eitter OSRIC. 

Osr. Your lordship is right welcome back to Denmark. 

Ham. I humbly thank you, sir. Dost know this water- 
fly? 

Hor. No, my good lord. 

Ham. Thy state is the more gracious; for 'tis a vice to 
know him. He hath much land, and fertile: let a beast be 
lord of beasts, and his crib shall stand at the king's mess: 
'tis a chough; but, as I say, spacious in the possession of 
dirt. 90 

Osr. Sweet lord, if your lordship were at leisure, I should 
impart a thing to you from his majesty. 

Ham. I will receive it, sir, with all diligence of spirit. Put 
your bonnet to his right use ; 't is for the head. 

Osr. I thank your lordship, it is very hot. 

Ha?n. No, believe me, 'tis very cold; the wind is nor- 
therly. 

Osr. It is indifferent cold, my lord, indeed. 100 

Ham. But yet methinks it is very sultry and hot for my 
complexion. 

Osr. Exceedingly, my lord; it is very sultry, — as 'twere, — 
I cannot tell how. But, my lord, his majesty bade me signify 
to you that he has laid a great wager on your head: sir, this 
is the matter, — 

Hajn. I beseech you, remember — 

[Hamlet moves him to put on his hat. 

Osr. Nay, good my lord; for mine ease, in good faith. 
Sir, here is newly come to court Laertes; believe me, an 
absolute gentleman, full of most excellent differences, of 
very soft society and great showing: indeed, to speak 
feelingly of him, he is the card or calendar of gentry, for you 
shall find in him the continent of what part a gentleman 
would see. 

Ham. Sir, his definement suffers no perdition in you; 
though, I know, to divide him inventorially would dizzy the 
arithmetic of memory, and yet but yaw neither, in respect of 
his quick sail. But, in the verity of extolment, I take him to 
be a soul of great article ; and his infusion of such dearth and 
rareness, as, to make true diction of him, his semblable is 
his mirror; and who else would trace him, his umbrage, 
nothing more. 

Osr. Your lordship speaks most infallibly of him. 

Ham. The concernancy, sir? why do we wrap the gentle 
man in our more rawer breath ? 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. i!5 

Osr. Sir? 130 

Hor. Is't not possible to understand in another tongue? 
You will do 't, sir, really. 

Ham. What imports the nomination of this gentleman? 

Osr. Of Laertes ? 

Hor. His purse is empty already; all's golden words are 
spent. 

Ham. Of him, sir. 

Osr. I know you are not ignorant — 

Ham. I would you did, sir; yet, in faith, if you did, it 
would not much approve me. Well, sir? 

Osr. You are not ignorant of what excellence Laertes is — - 

Ham. I dare not confess that, lest I should compare with 
him in excellence ; but, to know a man well, were to know 
himself 

Osr. I mean, sir, for his weapon; but in the imputation 
laid on him by them, in his meed he 's unfellowed. 1 50 

Ha7n. What 's his weapon ? 

Osr. Rapier and dagger. 

Ha7ii. That's two of his weapons: but, well. 

Osr. The king, sir, hath wagered with him six Barbary 
horses: against the which he has imponed, as I take it, 
six French rapiers and poniards, with their assigns, as girdle, 
hangers, and so: three of the carriages, in faith, are very dear 
to fancy, very responsive to the hilts, most delicate carriages, 
and of very liberal conceit. 160 

Ham. What call you the carriages ? 

Hor. I knew you must be edified by the margent ere you 
had done. 

Osr. The carriages, sir, are the hangers. 

Ham. The phrase would be more german to the matter, 
if we could carry cannon by our sides: I would it might be 
hangers till then. But, on: six Barbary horses against six 
French swords, their assigns, and three liberal-conceited 
carriages; that's the French bet against the Danish. Why 
is this ' imponed', as you call it? 171 

Osr. The king, sir, hath laid, that in a dozen passes be- 
tween yourself and him, he shall not exceed you three hits : 
he hath laid on twelve for nine; and it would come to im- 
mediate trial, if your lordship would voachsafe the answer. 

Ham. How if I answer ' no ' ? 

Osr. I mean, my lord, the opposition of your person in 
trial. 179 

Ham. Sir, I will walk here in the hall: if it please his 
majesty, 't is the breathing time of day with me ; let the foils 



ii6 HAMLET. [Act V. 

be brought, the gentleman willing, and the knig hold his 
purpose, I will win for him an I can; if not, I will gain 
nothing but my shame and the odd hits. 

Osr. Shall I re-deliver you e'en so? 

Ham. To this effect, sir; after what flourish your nature will. 

Osr. I commend my duty to your lordship. 

Ham. Yours, yours. \Exit Osri'c] He does well to 
commend it himself; there are no tongues else for's turn. 

Hor. This lapwing runs away with the shell on his head. 

Ham. He did comply with his dug, before he sucked it. 
Thus has he — and many more of the same breed that I 
know the drossy age dotes on — only got the tune of the time 
and outward habit of encounter; a kind of yesty collection, 
which carries them through and through the most fond and 
winnowed opinions; and do but blow them to their trial, the 
bubbles are out. 

Enter a Lord, 

Lord. My lord, his majesty commended him to you by 
young Osric, who brings loack to him, that you attend him 
in the hall ; he sends to know if your pleasure hold to play 
with Laertes, or that you will take longer time. 

Ham. I am constant to my purposes; they follow the 
king's pleasure: if his fitness speaks, mine is ready; now or 
whensoever, provided I be so able as now. 211 

Lord. The king and queen and all are coming down. 

Ham. In happy time. 

Lord. The queen desires you to use some gentle entertain- 
ment to Laertes before you fall to play. 

Ham. She well instructs me. \Exit Lord. 

Hor. You will lose this wager, my lord. 

Ham. I do not think so: since he went into France, I 
have been in continual practice; I shall win at the odds. 
But thou wouldst not think how ill all's here about my heart: 
but it is no matter. 

Hor. Nay, good my lord, — 

Ha7n. It is but foolery; but it is such a kind of gain-giving, 
as would perhaps trouble a woman. 

Hor. If your mind dislike any thing, obey it : I will fore- 
stal their repair hither, and say you are not fit. 229 

Ham. Not a whit, we defy augury: there's a special 
providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, 't is not to 
come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, 
yet it will come: the readiness is all: since no man knows 
aught of what he leaves, what is't to leave betimes? 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 117 

Enter King, Queen, Laertes, Lords, OsRic, and 
Attendants with foils ^ &^c. 

King. Con-.e, Hamlet, come, and take this hand from me. 
\The Kingptits 'Laertes' hand ijtto Ha?nlefs. 
Ham. Give me your pardon, sir: I Ve done you wrong; 
But pardon 't, as you arp a gentleman. 
This presence knows, 

And you must needs have heard, how I am punish'd 240 

With sore distraction. What I have done. 
That might your nature, honour and exception 
Roughly awake, I here proclaim was madness. 
Was't Hamlet wrong'd Laertes? Never Hamlet: 
If Hamlet from himself be ta'en away. 
And when he 's not himself does wrong Laertes, 
Then Hamlet does it not, Hamlet denies it. 
Who does it, then? His madness: if 't be so, 
Hamlet is of the faction that is wrong'd ; 
His madness is poor Hamlet's enemy. 250 

Sir, in this audience, 
Let my disclaiming from a purposed evil 
Free me so far in your most generous thoughts, 
That I have shot mine arrow o'er the house, 
And hurt tny brother. 

Lcier. I am satisfied in nature. 

Whose motive, in this case, should stir me most 
To my revenge : but in my terms of honour 
I stand aloof; and will no reconcilement, 
Till by some elder masters, of known honour, 
I have a voice and precedent of peace, 260 

To keep my name ungored. But till that time, 
I do receive your ofifer'd love like love, 
And will not wrong it. 

Ham. I embrace it freely ; 

And will this brother's wager frankly play. 
Give us the foils. Come on. 

Laer. Come, one for me. 

Ham,. I '11 be your foil, Laertes: in mine ignorance 
Your skill shall, like a star i' the darkest night, 
Stick fiery off indeed. 

Laer. You mock me, sir. 

Ha77i. No, by this hand. 

King. Give them the foils, young Osric. Cousin Hamlet, 
You know the wager? 271 

Ham. Very well, my lord; 



/ 



ii8 HAMLET. [Act V. 

Your grace hath laid the odds o' the weaker side. 

King. I do not fear it; I have seen you both: 
But since he is better'd, we have therefore odds. 

Laer. This is too heavy, let me see another. 

Ham. This likes me well. These foils have all a length? 

[ They prepare to play. 

Osr. Ay, my good lord. 

King. Set me the stoups of wine upon that table. 
If Hamlet give thg. first or second hit, 

Or quit in answer of the third exchange, 280 

Let all the battlements their ordnance fire ; 
The king shall drink to Hamlet's better breath ; 
And in the cup an union shall he throw, 
Richer than that which four successive kings 
In Denmark's crown have worn. Give me the cups; 
And let the kettle to the trumpet speak. 
The trumpet to the cannoneer without, 
The cannons to the heavens, the heavens to earth, 
' Now the king drinks to Hamlet'. Come, begin: 
And you, the judges, bear a wary eye. 290 

Ham. Come on, sir. 

Laer. Come, my lord, \They play. 

Ham. One. 

Laer. No. 

Ham. Judgement. 

Osr. A hit, a very palpable hit. 

Laer. Well ; again. 

King. Stay; give me drink. Hamlet, this pearl is thine; 
Here 's to thy health. 

[Trumpets sound, and can?to?t shot off within. 
Give him the cup. 

Ham. I '11 play this bout first ; set it by awhile. 
Come. \They play^ Another hit; what say you? 

Laer. A touch, a touch, I do confess. 

King. Our son shall win. 

Quee?i. He's fat, and scant ot breath. 

Here, Hamlet, take my napkin, rub thy brows: 
The queen carouses to thy fortune, Hamlet. 300 

Ham. Good madam ! 

King. Gertrude, do not drink. 

Queen. I will, my lord ; I pray you, pardon me. 

King. [Aside] It is the poison'd cup : it is too late. 

Ham. I dare not drink yet, madam ; by and by. 

Quee7i. Come, let me wipe thy face. 

Laer. My lord, I '11 hit him now. 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 119 

King. I do not think 't. 

Laer. [Aside] And yet 't is almost 'gainst my conscience. 

Ham. Come, for the third, Laertes : you but dally ; 
I pray you, pass with your best violence ; 
I am afeard you make a wanton of me. 310 

Laer. Say you so? come on. \They play. 

Osr. Nothing, neither way, 

Laer. Have at you now ! 

\Laertes woujids Hamlet; then., in scufflijtg., they 
chaftge rapiers., a?td Hamlet woiwds Laertes. 

King. Part them ; they are incensed. 

Ham. Nay, come, again. \The Queen falls. 

Osr. Look to the queen there, ho ! 

Hor. They bleed on both sides. How is it, my lord? 

Osr. How is 't, Laertes? 

Laer. Why, as a woodcock to mine own springe, Osric ; 
I am justly kill'd with mine own treachery. 

Ham. How does the queen? 

King. She swounds to see them bleed. 

Queen. No, no, the drink, the drink, — O my dear Hamlet, — 
The drink, the drink ! I am poison'd. [Dies. 

Ham. O villany! Ho! let the door be lock'd: 322 

Treachery I Seek it out. 

Laer. It is here, Hamlet: Hamlet, thou art slain; 
No medicine in the world can do thee good ; 
In thee there is not half an hour of life; 
The treacherous instrument is in thy hand, 
Unbated and envenom'd : the foul practice 
Hath turn'd itself on me ; lo, here I lie, 

Never to rise again : thy mother 's poison'd : 330 

I can no more : the king, the king 's to blame. 

Ham. The point envenom'd too ! 
Then, venom, to thy work. [Stabs the King. 

All. Treason ! treason ! 

Ki7tg. O, yet defend me, friends ; I am but hurt. 

Ham. Here, thou incestuous, murderous, damned Dane, 
Drink off this potion. Is thy union here? 
Follow my mother. [King dies. 

Laer. He is justly served ; 

It is a poison temper'd by himself 

Exchange forgiveness with me, noble Hamlet : 340 

Mine and my father's death come not upon thee, 
Nor thine on me ! [Dies. 

- Ham. Heaven make thee free of it ! I follow thee. 
I am dead, Horatio. Wretched queen, adieu ! 



I20 HAMLET. [Act V. 

You that look pale and tremble at this chance, 
That are but mutes or audience to this act, 
Had I but time — as this fell sergeant, death, 
Is strict in his arrest — O, I could tell you — 
But let it be. Horatio, I am dead ; 

Thou livest ; report me and my cause aright 350 

To the unsatisfied. 

' Hor. Never believe it : 

I am more an antique Roman than a Dane : 
Here's yet some liquor Left. 

Ham. h'Sy thou'rt a man, 

Give me the cup : let go ; by heaven, I '11 have 't. 

good Horatio, what a wounded name. 

Things standing thus unknown, shall live behind me ! 
If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart. 
Absent thee from felicity awhile, 
And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain, 
To tell my story. \March afar off, and shot within. 

What warlike noise is this? 360 

Osr. Young Fortinbras, with conquest come from Poland, 
To the ambassadors of England gives 
This warlike volley. 

Ham. O, I die, Horatio; 

The potent poison quite o'er-crows my spirit : 

1 cannot live to hear the news from England ; 
But I do prophesy the election lights 

On Fortinbras : he has my dying voice ; 
So tell him, with the occurrents, more and less, 
Which have solicited. The rest is silence, \pies. 

Hor. Now cracks a noble heart. Good night, sweet prince ; 
And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest! 371 

Why does the drum come hither? \March within. 

Enter Fortinbras, the English Ambassadors, and others. 

Fort. Where is this sight? 

Hor. What is it ye would see? 

If aught of woe or wonder, cease your search. 

Fort. This quarry cries on havoc. O proud death, 
What feast is toward in thine eternal cell, 
That thou so many princes at a shot 
So bloodily hast struck? 

First Amb. The sight is dismal ; 

And our affairs from England come too late : 
The ears are senseless that should give us hearing, 380 

To tell him his commandment is fulfill'd, 



^r^ 



Scene 2.] HAMLET. 121 

That Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead : 
Where should we have our thanks? 

Hor. Not from his mouth, 

Had it the abihty of life to thank you : 
He never gave commandment for their death. 
But since, so jump upon this bloody question, 
You from the Polack wars, and you from England, 
Are here arrived, give order that these bodies 
High on a stage be placed to the view; 

And let me speak to the yet unknowing world 390 

How these things came about: so shall you hear 
Of carnal, bloody, and unnatural acts, 
Of accidental judgements, casual slaughters, 
Of deaths put on by cunning and forced cause, 
And, in this upshot, purposes mistook 
Fall'n on the inventors' heads : all this can I 
Truly deliver. 

Fort. Let us haste to hear it. 

And call the noblest to the audience. 
For me, with sorrow I embrace my fortune : 
I have some rights of memory in this kingdom, 400 

Which now to claim my vantage doth invite me. 

Hor. Of that I shall have also cause to speak. 
And from his mouth whose voice will draw on more : 
But let this same be presently perform'd. 
Even while men's minds are wild ; lest more mischance, 
On plots and errors, happen. 

Fort. Let four captains 

Bear Hamlet, like a soldier, to the stage ; 
For he was likely, had he been put on, 
To have proved most royally : and, for his passage, 
The soldiers' music and the rites of war \\o 

Speak loudly for him. 
Take up the bodies : such a sight as this 
Becomes the field, but here shows much amiss. 
Go, bid the soldiers shoot. 

\A dead march. Exeunt.^ bearing off the dead bodies; 
after which a peal of ordnance is shot off. 



NOTES. 



T'hese notes should be used with the Glossary, to which the student is 
referred for all matters of merely verbal interpretatiiu. 

Reference is made throughout to the lines of the Globe text. Where 
this might have caused any inconvenience, the lines of the 
' present edition have been added in italics. 

The symbols Q i, Q 2, Q 3, Q 4, Q 5, Q 6 denote the quarto editions 
of 1603 (first sketch), 1604, 1605, 161 1, the undated fifth quarto, and 
1637; F I, F 2, F 3, F4, the folio editions of 1623, 1632, 1664, 1685. 
Qq. denotes the consent of all the quartos except Q i, Ff. that of all 
the folios. 

Reference on points of grammar is made to the sections of the 3rd 
edition of Abbott's Shakespearian Grammar; for passages from other 
plays to Macmillan's Globe edition of the poet. The parallel text of 
Q I, Q 2, and F i may be profitably studied in Victor's edition 
{Shakespeare Reprints, Marburg, 1891). 

Dratnatis Personce. This list is not in the Qq. or Ff. It was 
added by Rowe. The spelling adopted is that of F i. 

The division into Acts and Scenes is traditional ; neither being 
given before the Players' Quarto of 1676, and in that only the Acts. 
The earlier Qq. have not got it, and in the Ff. it only extends as far 
as act ii. sc. 2. Mr. Rose {New Shakspere Society Transactions, 
iSyj-g) has argued that the accepted division is incorrect ; but it 
would not be convenient to adopt any other here. 

Mr. Rose's paper will, however, repay careful study. He would 
retain the present endings of acts i. and iv. Act ii. he would end 
with the present iii. I, and act iii. with the present iv. 3. "Such 
an arrangement", he says, "is thoroughly Shakespeai-ian ; each act 
has its unity — the first is filled by the Ghost, the second by Hamlet's 
assumed madness and the king's attempts to fathom it, the third by 
the doings of one tremendous night, the fourth contains miscellaneous 
intermediate incidents, and the fifth ends all things." 

Act I.— Scene 1. 

Elsinore. A platform before the castle. Notes of locality are not 
given in the Qq. and Ff.; but Elsinore is mentioned in ii. 2. 278, 
and the platform, or terrace, in i. 2. 252. 

The two opening scenes put the spectator in full possession of the 
situation of affairs in Denmark. The death and character of the late 
king, his reappearance to denote some unknown evil, the threats of 
war, and the consequent need for strong men, are emphasized in the 
first ; the second adds the personal relations of Hamlet with the 
royal house, and depicts his state of mind at the beginning of the 
action. Coleridge has an excellent note on Shakespeare's first 



Scene i.] NOTES. 123 

scenes. " With the single exception of Cymbelhte they either place 
before us at one glance both the past and the future in some effect 
which implies the continuance and full agency of its cause, as in the 
feuds and party-spirit of the servants of the two houses in the first 
scene oi Ro7neo and Juliet; or in the degrading passion for shows and 
public spectacles, and the overwhelming attachment for the newest 
successful v\^ar-chief in the Roman people, already become a populace, 
contrasted with the jealousy of the nobles in Jii/ms Cocsar; — or they 
at once commence the action so as to excite a curiosity for the ex- 
planation in the following scenes, as in the storm, of wind and waves, 
and the boatswain in The Tempest, instead of anticipating our curi- 
osity, as in most other first scenes, and in too many other first acts ; 
— or they act, by contrast of diction suited to the characters, at once 
to heighten the effect, and yet to give a naturalness to the language 
and rhythm of the principal personages, either in that of Prospero and 
Miranda by the appropriate lowness of the style, or, as in King Jokn^ 
by the equally appropriate stateliness of official harangues or narra- 
tives, so that the after blank verse seems to belong to the rank and 
quality of the speakers, and not to the poet ; — or they strike at once 
the key-note and give the predominant spirit of the play, as in the 
Twelfth Night and in Macbeth;— ox finally, the first scene comprises 
all these advantages at once, as in Hamlet.'^'' 

Horatio is carefully differentiated from Marcellus, Bernardo, and 
Francisco : they are unlettered soldiers ; he is a scholar, and, as 
such, has his t©uches both of imagination and scepticism. 

I. The scene opens amid nervous suspense; there is a tradition 
that it was written in a charnel-house. '"Tis bitter cold", and 
silent, and the watcher is "sick at heart". On two previous nights 
the ghost has appeared, to Bernardo and Marcellus. Bernardo's 
agitation shows itself in the way he challenges the guard, instead of 
waiting to be challenged. 

6. upon, immediately after; cf. Much Ado, v. i. 258, "And fled 
he is upon this villany", and Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 191. 

13. rivals. Q i has partners, but the sense is the same. See 
Glossary, s.v. 

15. this ground, the land of Denmark. 

16. Give you, probably an ellipse for *God give you', rather 
than for 'I give you'. 

ig. A piece of him, not merely a humorous answer, equivalent 
to 'something like him'. Horatio hints that although he is there 
in bodily presence, he is not in sympathy with his friend's expectation 
of seeing the ghost. 

21. This line is given to Horatio in Q 2, to Marcellus in Q i 
and F I. In the one case the actor will speak of 'this thing' with 
horroi?, in the other with derision. 



124 HAMLET. [Act I. 

31. assail your ears is followed somewhat irregularly by "what 
we have seen" because it is practically equivalent to 'tell you'. Cf. 
Abbott, S/i. Gr. § 252. 

36. yond same star, probably the Great Bear, which swings 
round the pole. Shakespeare's diction is unfettered by any laws 
beyond those of his free-will. He says 'this time last night' if he 
pleases, or he expands the same idea in a descriptive and allusive 
fashion. Similarly in lines 118-9 he paraphrases the moon as 

"the moist star 
Upon whose influence Neptune's empire stands". 

42. a scholar. Exorcisms were of course performed in Latin in 
the palindrome " Signa te signa, temere me tangis et angis". Cf 
Much Ado, ii. I. 264, "I would to God some scholar would conjure 
her". 

44. harrows. So F i. Q i has horrors, Q 2 horrows. Cf. 
Milton, Camus, 565, "Amaz'd I stood, harrowed with fear and grief". 

Horatio's scepticism has vanished once for all before "the sensible 
and true avouch" of his own eyes. Hamlet's persistent doubts and 
questionings do not occur to him, though, indeed, he is inclined to 
explain the spirit as an 'illusion' (line 127). 

46. usurp'st, in the wide sense of 'usest without right', appli- 
cable equally to the 'time of night' and the appearance of the king. 

60. For the difficulty of time suggested by Horatio's reminiscence, 
and connected with that of Hamlet's age, see v. i. 154, note. 

62, 63. The reading of Q i, Q 2, F i, is — 

' ' when in an angry parle 
He smote the sleaded {sledded, F i) pollax on the ice". 

The interpretation of the lines has puzzled commentators. There 
are two possible meanings: (i) We may read with Malone the 
sledded Folacks, i.e. 'the Poles who ride in sledges'. The form 
Polack occurs in ii. 2. 63, 75 ; iv. 4. 23, and v. 3. 287. "An angry 
parle" will then mean 'a skirmish', and the allusion will be to some 
war, not with the Norwegians, but with the Poles. (ii) "The 
sledded poleaxe" may be a poleaxe weighted with a sledge or 
hammer at the back. I have preferred the second explanation for 
three reasons: {a) a 'parle' or parley elsewhere in Shakespeare 
always means a conference; {b) a conference is more likely than a 
battle to take place *on the ice', i.e. on some bordering stream, 
which would be neutral ground; {c) Horatio only saw the elder 
Hamlet once (i. 2. 186), and presumably on a peaceful occasion, when 
his beaver was up, so that his appearance could be remembered; 
{d) the whole phrase suits best with some moment of sudden wrath, 
and not with a day's fighting. Moltke needlessly proposes to read 
leaded, edged, or sledged poleaxe. 



Scene i.] NOTES. 125 

65. jump. So Q 2. F I has the more commonplace yV/j-/. 

68. i.e. 'speaking generally'; 'Some evil is portended', says 
Horatio, ' though I know not precisely what'. 

70. Good, an appellative, 'good sirs'; cf. Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 13. 

72. toils, makes to toil ; Shakespeare uses many verbs transitively, 
especially in a causal sense, which are now only used intransitively; 
cf. Abbott, Sh. Gr. §§ 290, 291. 

85. so, i.e. as valiant; cf. Macbeth, i. i. 16, "brave Macbeth — 
well he deserves that name". 

87. Well ratified by law and heraldry; i.e. not only according 
to the civil law, but also according to the formalities of the court 
of chivalry. This court, a characteristic mediaeval institution, took 
cognizance of matters of coat-armour or heraldry proper, and also, 
to some extent, of international law. See Appendix to my edition 
of Richard 11. in the Falcon Series. 

90. a moiety competent, an equivalent slice of territory. 

96. unapproved, untried. Q i reads inapproved; Q 2 and F i un- 
improved, which might mean 'unemployed', 'not turned to account'; 
Q.{. Julius CcEsar, ii. I. 159, "His means, if he improve them, may 
well stretch so far". But the idea of 'mettle of proof is a common 
one. 

98. list. Q I reads sight, in the modern slang sense. 

100. hath a stomach in 't, gives an opportunity for courage. 

loi. our state, our rulers. 

108-125. These lines are not in F i. 

log. The meaning ascribed by the watchers to the coming of the 
ghost shows that no suspicion of the king's murder had as yet been 
awaked in the court. 

112. Horatio is not minimizing the importance of the apparition; 
it is a small thing, but it portends great trouble. 

114. The prodigies in Rome are described m. Julius Ccesar, act i. 
sc. 3, where Cassius speaks of them (line 70) as 

" instruments of fear and warning 
Unto some monstrous state". 

The Julius C(2sar passage is taken from North's Plutarch ; this in 
Hamlet perhaps partly from Lucan, Pharsalia, i. 526 — 
" Ignota obscurse viderunt sidere noctes, 
ardentemque polum flammis, coeloque volantes 
obliquas per inane faces, crinemque timendi 
sideris, et terris mutantem regna cometen". 

Lucan mentions also the eclipse and the appearance of the dead in 
the streets. 



126 HAMLET. [Act I. 

117. The connection of this line with the preceding is so abrupt 
that some editors have thought that Hues 121-125 should come be- 
tween them. Others insert a conjectural line, as Boaden's "7"/^^ 
heavens too spoke in silent prodigies ", or attempt to emend the text. 
Malone has — 

Astres with trains of fire — a7id dews of blood 

Disastrous dimmed the sun. 

For the last line of this Staunton would substitute Distempered the 
sun, or Discoloured the smi. But a comet cannot very well dim the 
sun, and astres is a very rare word, and "disasters in the sun" are 
clearly sun-spots. The simplest explanation is that a line is missing, 
but it is useless to try and rewrite it. — Comets were supposed to 
cause the phenomenon of red dews, which is now said to proceed 
from innumerable butterflies, each of which lets fall a drop of red 
liquid as it emerges from the chrysalis. 

119. The influence of the moon upon the tides is again alluded 
to in Winter'' s Tale, i. 2. 426 — 

"you may as well 
Forbid the sea for to obey the moon". 

Either because of this influence, or for the paleness of its radiance, 
especially as seen through clouds, Shakespeare frequently applies the 
epithet 'watery' to the moon. 

120. almost to doomsday. In the description of the second 
coming of the Son of Man, given in S. Matt. xxiv. 29, it is prophesied 
that the sun shall "be darkened, and the moon not give her light". 
Cf. also Rev. vi. 12, "the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and 
the moon became as blood". 

127. Crossing the spot where an apparition appeared was supposed 
to bring down its evil influence on the rash spectator. 

138. they say. Cf. lines 149, 165. Horatio is a scholar and 
acquainted with theories of the supernatural. He knows the com- 
mon causes which make spirits walk. 

139. The stage-directions, here and in line 127, are from Q 2. 

154. extravagant and erring. The Latin extravagare and errare 
both mean, in their radical sense, ' to wander abroad'. Shakespeare 
is fond of such uses, which seem to suggest a larger measure, at 
least of Latin scholarship, than he is usually credited with. 

161. dare stir. So Q 2. F i has can walk, Q i dare walk. 

162. Planets, when in their malignant aspect, were supposed to 
injure the incautious traveller by night; cf. Coriolanus, ii. 2. 117 — 

"with a sudden reinforcement struck 
Corioli like a planet". 

We still use the phrase 'moonstruck'; see, e.g., R. Browning, One 
Word More, xvL 



Scene 2.] NOTES. 127 

163. takes. So Q I, Q 2. F i YidiSialks. 'To take' is 'to affect', 
'to charm'. See Glossary, j.z'. 

165. Horatio is half attracted by ^he imaginative theory, half 
sceptical. 

166. russet. The earliest colour of dawn is not red but grey. 
Cf. Much Ado, V. 3. 29 — 

"the gentle day 
Before the wheels of Phoebus, round about 
Dapples the drowsy east with spots of grey"; 

and Romeo and Jtiliet, iii. 5. 19, "I'll say yon grey is not the 
morning's eye". 

167. eastern. So F i. Q 2 has eastward. A comparison be- 
tween this beautiful metaphor and the cruder version given in Q I 
will show the subtle art with which Shakespeare carried out his 
revision of the play. Q i has — 

" But see, the sun in russet mantle clad 
Walks o'er the dew of yon high mountain top". 

The art consists in the rearrangement of the alliteration so as to 
connect the words in a more melodious fashion. 

170. The first mention of Hamlet in the play, preparing us for 
the introduction of him in the next scene. 

Scene 2. 

Hamlet's brief dialogue vv^ith the King and Queen and his subse- 
quent soliloquy sufficiently acquaint us with his mood. He has no 
idea of his uncle's crime, though he detests his character; but his 
moral sense has received a severe shock from his mother's marriage. 
The whole world appears to him, in consequence, under the dominion 
of evil; he would gladly be quit of it. But that cannot be, and, 
moreover, he cannot do anything, nor even speak his feelings out. 
He must take refuge in irony and sarcasm, or, when possible, in 
silence. 

Claudius is a hypocrite, but his hypocrisy is that of a statesman ; 
he plays his part with a dignity and a keen insight into what is need- 
ful for the welfare of the state, which explain how the council came 
to choose him king. 

The scene opens with a bridal procession. It is the custom of the 
stage for Hamlet to come on last, slowly and reluctantly, and clad 
in black, amongst the glittering draperies of the court. 

The stage-direction is that of F I ; Q 2 has Enter Claudius King 
of Denmark, Gertrad the Queen, Connsaile as Polonius and his son 
Laertes, Hamlet cum aliis. I believe that the curious phrase Conn- 
saile as Polonius contains a trace of the name Coratnbis, which occurs 
in the stage-direction of Q I. If the name was somehow left in the 
MS. side by side with the substituted Polonius, the printer may 



128 HAMLET. [Act I. 

have tried to make sense of it in his own way. Cf. ii. i. i, note, 
and Appendix A. 

7. This line explains the "wisest" of line 6. 

II. an. ..a. So Q2.; Fi has one. ..one. The Fi reading rather 
strains the antithesis. But cf. Winter's Tale, v. 2. 80, ' ' She had 
one eye declined for the loss of her husband, another elevated that 
the oracle was fulfilled". For the idea cf. the daKpvoev yeXdaacra 
('laughing tearfully') of Homer, Iliad, vi. 484. It is an oxymoron, 
which the grammarians describe as ' a contrast by juxtaposition of 
opposing ideas '. Shakespeare is fond of the conceit ; a good instance 
is in Romeo and Juliet, i. i. 182— , 

"Why, then, O brawling love! O loving hate! 
O anything, of nothing first create ! 
O heavy lightness ! serious vanity ! 
Mis-shapen chaos of well-seeming forms ! 
Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health! 
Still- waking sleep, that is not what it is ". 

He burlesques it, however, in Midsummer Nighfs Dream, v. i, 56. 

17. that you know is parenthetical, 'that which you already 
know '. 

18. a weak supposal of our worth, a supposal that our worth 
is weak. Such transpositions of adjectives are common in Shake- 
speare; cf. Macbeth, ii. i. 55, "Tarquin's ravishing strides ". 

21. His hope of gain is allied with his poor opinion of his adver- 
sary. 

22. After a long parenthesis the foregoing subject is often recalled 
by a pronoun ; cf. Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 242. 

24. Cf. i. I. 87. 

25, Claudius mentions his brother three times in this carefully- 
prepared speech, and always with an epithet of affection or flattery. 

31. in that gives the grounds for Norway's interference. 

32. proportions, of the army, horse to foot, &c. 

34. Q I has Cornelia and Voltemar. 

38. delated. So Q 2; P' i ha.?, dilated, Q i related. 'Dilated articles' 
would mean ' articles set out at large ' ; ' delated articles ' is ' articles 
setting forth what powers are delated, delegated, or made over to 
you'. 

60. The metaphor is legal, Laertes' will is like a deed, illegal 
until his father's hard-won consent has ratified it. Lines 58-60, 
except the sentence " He hath, my Lord", are omitted in F I. 

62. Take thy fair hour, enjoy the privileges of youth. 



Scene 2.] NOTES. 129 

65. Hamlet is now Claudius' son, and therefore in a closer relation- 
ship to him than that of a mere kinsman. But in feeling they are 
far from ' kind ' or ' affectionate ' towards each other. 

66. too much i' the sun. Hamlet ironically replies that he is 
too much in the sunshine of the royal presence to be gloomy. There 
may also be a play of words between S7in and son : * You call me 
your son, and so I am, a mere prince, who should be a king'. 
Hamlet does not dwell on his loss of the crown, but it is one of the 
bitter drops in his cup; cf v. 2. 65, " Popped in between the election 
and my hopes ". ' To be i' the sun ' appears also to be a proverbial 
phrase for ' to be miserable '. 

74. Hamlet's reply means, 'it is common; but does it hurt the 
less?' The same idea is repeated in The Tempest, ii. i. 3 — - 

" Our hint of woe 
Is common ; every day some sailor's wife, 
The masters of some merchant and the merchant 
Have just our theme of woe ". 

And still more exactly in Tennyson, In Memoriam, vi. — 

" One writes, that ' Other friends remain ', 
That ' Loss is common to the race ' — 
And common is the commonplace, 
And vacant chaff well meant for grain. 

" That loss is common would not make 
My own less bitter, rather more : 
Too common ! Never morning wore 
To evening, but some heart did break ". 

78. customary suits, either ' the conventional garb of mourning ' 
or ' the suits which I am accustomed to wear '. 

82. moods, less the inner feelings than the outward poses or atti- 
tudes of grief. Hamlet is contrasting the appearance with the reality. 
Therefore the shows of F I is better than the shapes of Q 2. 

92. obsequious sorrow, in the double sense of ' dutiful sorrow ' 
and 'sorrow as shown in obsequies, or funeral rites'. 

95. incorrect, rather a participle than an adjective, referring more 
to the process than the result; 'not corrected', 'not trained into the 
right attitude '. 

97. unschool'd. Cf. Merchant of Venice, iii. 2. 161, "an un- 
lessoned girl, unschooled, impractised ". Shakespeare, like Milton, 
is fond of piling up negative adjectives in this way, 

gg. any the most vulgar thing to sense. Cf. Cymbeline, i. 4. 
65, "any the rarest"; He7iry VIII. ii. 4. 48, "one the wisest"; and, 
for the transposition, Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 419^;. 

no. nobility, apparently in the sense of 'a high degree'. 
( 885 ) I 



I30 HAMLET. [Act I. 

112. impart, used intransitively, 'impart myself, 'offer myself. 
Several emendations have been suggested to avoid the intransitive 
use, the best being Mason's, Do I my part toward yo2i. 

113. Wittenberg. The university was really founded in 1502. 
It was made famous by Martin Luther. 

114. The subject is repeated in the pronoun; cf. line 22, and 
Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 243. 

117. cousin, the usual term of courtesy used by a king to his 
nobles. 

125. " The king's intemperance is very strongly impressed; every- 
thing that happens to him gives him occasion to drink" (Johnson). 
Additional solemnity is to be imparted to the present revel by the 
firing of salutes; cf. v. 2. 278, sqq. 

126. tell appears to be used intransitively for 'speak', without 
an object. 

129. The idea of suicide, which occupies Hamlet's mind in iii. I. 
56 sqq.^ has already occurred to him. 

too too. Such reduplications have an intensive force, and are 
common in Elizabethan writers ; cf. iii. 3. 8, and Sonnet ex. " Even 
to thy pure and most most loving breast ". 

solid. The contrast is with ' dew ', and therefore the use of the 
word here need not imply that Hamlet is fat; cf. v. 2. 271, note. 
But too too solid is only the reading of F I. Q 2 has too too sallied and 
Q I too much gi'iev'd and sallied. I incline to think that sallied is 
right, in the sense of 'vexed'; cf. ii. I. 39 (Q2), and cf. Wordsworth, 
Ode on the Intimations of hjimortality^ vii. "fretted by sallies of his 
mother's kisses ". 

132. Cf. Cytnbeline, iii. 4. 77 — 

"Against self-slaughter 
There is a prohibition so divine 
That cravens my weak hand". 

It need hardly be said that there is nothing about self- slaughter in 
the Bible. "Unless it be the Sixth Commandment, the 'canon' 
must be one of natural religion." (Bp. Wordsworth.) 

134. uses, the customary, usual occupations of life. 

138. two months; cf. iii. 2. iii. 

140. Shakespeare, like Gray and Keats, accents Hyperion, in- 
stead of Hyperion. Hyperion was the Titanic Sun-god; cf. iii. 4. 
56. 

149. Niobe, a daughter of Tantalus, boasted that she had more 
sons and daughters than Leto. Consequently Apollo and Artemis 
slew her children with arrows, and she herself was turned by Zeus 
into a stone upon Mount Sipylus in Lydia, where she sheds tears all 
the summer long ; cf. Sophocles, Antigone, 823. 



Scene 2,] NOTES. 131 

150. Q I has devoid of reason. Discourse is the Latin disc7irsiis, 
the process of the intellect from premises to conclusion in an argu- 
ment. 

154. unrighteous, because her subsequent conduct gave then-i the 
lie. 

158. nor it cannot. The double negative is frequent in Shake- 
speare; cf. Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 406. 

159. Hamlet does not speak of his mother's disgrace in public, 
nor, until the command of the Ghost is laid upon him, upbraid her in 
private. 

160. The news of the apparition breaks in upon Hamlet's musings. 
It excites him, he eagerly questions concerning it, and jumps at once 
to the conclusion that ther.e has been some foul play. This has not 
struck the others, but then Hamlet is ready to think the worst of 
his uncle. 

161. Hamlet is full of thought when he first greets the new-comer, 
then he looks up, and recognizes his friend. 

163. I'll change. ..with you, either, 'I will be your servant, 
you my friend ', or ' I will call you, and you me, friend '. Cf. line 
254. 

167. Good even, sir. This is spoken to Bernardo. 

175. Satire; directly the surprise of seeing Horatio has worn off, 
the bitterness of Hamlet's heart rises to his lips. The reading is 
that of Q I, F I. Q 2 has /or to drink. 

182. my dearest foe. Shakespeare uses the epithet 'dear' of 
anything that nearly touches the emotions in any way. See Glossary, 
s.v. 

186. Horatio is about to say, as he says in line 189, 'I saw him 
yesternight '. He breaks off nervously and substitutes ' once '. For 
that occasion cf. i. i. 60-63, notes. 

187. Cf. Julius Cczsar, v. 5- 73 — 

"His life was gentle, and the elements 
So mixed in him that nature might stand up 
And say to all the world, ' This was a man ! ' " 

igo. who, Shakespeare often uses 'who' for ' whom ' ; cf. Abbott, 
Sh. Gr. § 274. 

193, attent. In the transitional state of the language during the 
Elizabethan period, shortened forms of common words are frequently 
found, Cf. Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 22, and 'avouch' (i. i. 37). 

198, the dead waste. Q 2, F i have wast, which may represent 
' waste ' or ' waist '; Q i has vast. Both ' waste ' and ' vast ' have tlie 
sense of ' emptiness ', ' stillness ', " The vast of night " occurs in '/'/le 
Tempest, i. 2. 327. "The waist of night " is found in Marston's 



132 HAMLET. [Act I. 

Malecontent. 'Waist' and 'middle' would here be tautologous, but 
such tautologies are frequent in Shakespeare's exuberant vocabulary. 

200. at point. So Q 2 ; F i has at all points. In either case the 
meaning is 'completely'; cf. Glossary, s.v. poifit. 

202. slow and stately. Adjectives are often used for adverbs ; 
cf. Abbott, Sh. Gr. %i. 

204. distill'd. So Q2; Fi has bestilled. 'Distilled to jelly' is 
an odd phrase. To ' distil ' is properly to convert into drops (Lat. 
stilla) of liquid; here it seems to mean 'softened', 'weakened'. 
Many emendations have been proposed, as, be-chilled, dissolved. 
betJi rilled. 

It is no doubt the quaking of jelly that Shakespeare has in mind. 

205. act, like the Latin actus, is here used of the patient, rather 
than the agent. 

216. it. Cf. v. I. 293. In Shakespeare's time his was just begin- 
ning to give place to its as the genitive of it. Transition forms are 
it, as here, and ifs. It occurs about fourteen times in F i. In the 
Authorized Version of the Bible, his is almost invariable, but // occurs 
in Leviticus, xxv. 5, "of it own accord"; cf. Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 228; 
and Craik, English of Shakespeare, p. 91. 

222. writ down. So Q 2, F i ; Q i has right done. 

226. I do not think that Hamlet's rapid questions imply any doubt 
of his friend's good faith. He is immensely impressed with the 
story, and curious to know every detail. 

242. Cf. Sonnet xii. 4, "And sable curls all silvered o'er with 
white ". 

244. Hamlet professes to think the ghost an ' illusion', as Horatio 
did. But to himself he calls it 'my father's spirit'. But the doubt 
comes back to him, and it is long before he can satisfy himself; cf. 
i. 4. 40 ; ii. I. 580. 

The belief that supernatural appearances were the work of evil 
spirits was common in Elizabethan times. In Macbeth, v. 8. 19, the 
witches are called "juggling fiends", 

248. tenable. So Q 2 ; F i has treble. 

254. Cf. line 163. 

Scene 3. 

The principal elements in the situation of things at Elsinore have 
been put before us in the first two scenes ; the need for a man of 
action, and the supernatural suggestion of some hidden evil in scene 
I, the position and nature of Hamlet in scene 2. The presenc scene 
completes the picture by showing the contrast to Hamlet afforded by 
the family of Polonius, who may be taken as typical of the court at 
Elsinore. All are carefully drawn on a lower scale than his, shallow 



Scene 3.] NOTES. i33 

where he is subtle, commonplace where he is original. None the 
less, the portrait of the gentle maiden, Ophelia, is touched so as to 
win our sympathies. She is no mate for Hamlet ; yet in her own 
sphere she is a beautiful and lovable character. Polonms is a 
politician without being a statesman, Laertes an apt representative 
of gilded youth as it existed at the court of Elizabeth. Both have 
low ideals ; the father is consumed with the conceit of his own 
intellect and experience, which have shown him only the lower side 
of humanity; the son is ' Italianate', degraded in tone by his life in 
a foreign city; both are incredulous, not only of the purity and 
honour of Hamlet, but of that of Ophelia herself. 

2. as, not 'because', but 'according as', 'whensoever'. Cf. 
Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 109. 

6. a toy in blood, a passing fancy of youth. For the use of 
'toy' cf. i. 4. 76, "toys of desperation". 

12. The Scriptural metaphor of the temple of the body recurs in 
Macbeth, ii. 3. 72— 

" Most sacrilegious murder hath broke ope 
The Lord's anointed temple". 

21. safety. So Q 2 ; F l has sanctity. ' Safety' must of coarse 
be scanned as a trisyllable ; cf. Essay on Metre, § 6 (in). 

26. act and place. So Q 2; F i has sect atid force. 

Lines 36-39 are preceded by inverted commas in Q 2, perhaps 
because thev are of the nature of maxims. Lines 61-77, and some 
lines which 'take the place of Polonius' speech 115, sqq., are similarly 
printed in Q i . 

45 Laertes' advice is such as his own experience has taught him. 
Ophelia is partly impressed by her brother's worldly wisdom, yet 
she is not without an intimation of the shallowness of it. 

50. Notice the change from the plural to the singular, characteristic 
of the loose Elizabethan syntax ; and for the opposite construction, 
see iii. 2, 200. Cf. also Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 415. 

the primrose path. Cf. Macbeth, ii. 3. 51, "Some of all pro- 
fessions that go the primrose way to the everlasting bonfire ; and 
Alps Well, iv. 5. 56, "the flowery way that leads to the broad gate 
and the great fire". Also R. L. Stevenson, Underwoods i. xi.— 
' ' Life is over, life was gay ; 
We have come the primrose way". 

57. There. 'The natural explanation of the word is that Polonius 
lays his hand upon Laertes' head. But F I reads you are stayed for 
there. 

59. The precepts of Polonius may be summed up in the Greek 
ii-qUv Br^o^v, 'Don't go too far; avoid excess ; don't commit your- 
self. They are delivered in the formal sententious way character- 
istic of the old man. 



134 HAMLET. [Act I. 

64. dull thy palm, make thy friendliness too common. 

65. comrade. So F i ; Q i, Q 2 both read courage. 

74, Are of a most select. ..in that. This line is a well-known 
crux. The following are the readings of the three earliest editions : — 

Q I. And they of France of the chief rancke and siatio7i 
Are of a 77iost select and generall chiefe in that. 

Q 2. And they in Fraunce of the best ranch and station 
Or of a most select and getter ous chiefe in that. 

F I. And they in France of the best ranch and station 
Are of a most select and generotis cheffin that. 

Evidently F i gives a nearer approach to a possible text than either 
of the Qq. Moreover it is shown by lines 65, 76, to afford a better 
version of this speech than Q 2. The principal explanations and 
emendations are — 

{a) That given in the text, which is due to Collier. I think that 
the presence of chiefe in line 73 (Q i text) may have led to the 
erroneous substitution oi chiefe for choice in line 74. When the play 
was revised the exact cause of the repetition may have been missed, 
best substituted for chiefe in line 73, and the wrong word left in 
line 74. 

{b) Chief vasiy be a substantive, meaning literally 'head', and so 
'eminence' or 'superiority'. 

{c) Both sense and scansion may be improved by reading, as the 
Cambridge editors suggest — 

Are most select and generous, chief in that. 

Staunton and Ingleby read sheaf in the sense of 'set', 'clique'; 
according to the Euphuistic phrase 'gentlemen of the best sheaf, 
which occurs in Jonson's Magnetic Lady, act iii. sc. 4, Ingleby 
also suggests that the courage of the Qq. in line 65 is Euphuistic 
for 'a gallant'. 

76. loan. So F I ; Q 2 has love. 

78. Polonius' last maxim appears so profoundly true, if taken in 
its highest sense of 'Be true to your own ideal', that critics have 
doubted whether he is meant to be altogether ridiculous. But it 
must be remembered that the phrase may also be interpreted as 
* Look after yourself first, and you will find that honesty is the best 
policy'. And it would be a characteristic bit of Shakespeare's 
irony to put into Polonius' mouth words which really convey a great 
*"ieaning, but which he only understands in a far lower sense. 

81. ' May my blessing make my warnings the more acceptable.' 

88. Neither Polonius nor Laertes conceives that Hamlet may be 
genuinely in love with Ophelia. They interpret him after their own 
standard. And so Ophelia's ignorance is poisoned ; she becomes 
ready to distrust her lover, and to take her father's part against him. 



Scene 4.J NOTES. 135 

107. Polonius' delight in playing upon words is one side of his 
supreme satisfaction with himself, and especially with his powers of 
expression. Cf. ii. 2. 85, sqq. 

109. Running it. This is Collier's conjecture for the Wrong it 
of Q 2, and Roaming it of F 2. The phrase means ' hunting it 
through every twist and turn, as a greyhound hunts a hare'. Pope's 
Wronging it is nearer to Q 2, but less pointed. Warburton's 
Wrijtging it is another possible alternative. 

112, go to; a common phrase of reproach, or, rarely, of en- 
couragement. Cf. Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 185. 

115, springes to catch woodcocks, a proverbial phrase for the 
entangling of a simpleton. Cf. v. 2. 317. Harting states that the wood- 
cock was supposed to have no brains. The Clarendon Press editors 
quote Gosson, School of Abuse, p. 72 (ed. Arber), "When Comedy 
comes upon the stage, Cupid sets up a springe for woodcocks, which 
are entangled ere they descry the line, and caught before they mis- 
trust the snare ". 

116. prodigal, adjective for adverb ; cf. Abbott, Sh. Gr. §1. 
122. ' Do not entreat or entertain his suit so readily.' 

130. bonds. This is the reading of the Qq. Ff., and there does 
not appear to be any reason to follow the majority of modern editors 
in accepting Theobald's emendation, bazvds. 

131. This is for all, once for all. 

133. It is unnecessary to read momenfs for the moment of Q 2 
and Fi: for the use of 'moment' as an adjective cf. i. 5. 33, 
"Lethe wharf". 

Scene 4. 

The elements of the tragedy are now before the mind of the 
spectator ; the revelation of the ghost is the spark which sets them 
in motion. With this the first act, or prologue to the main action, 
naturally ends. Hamlet's problem is presented- to hnii ; the question 
is, " What will he make of it?" This must be decided in the course 
of the play by the laws of his character and circumstances. His 
first impulse is to believe and to revenge ; yet, even so early as this, 
the hastily conceived design of simulating madness is a foretaste of 
what is to follow. 

Scenes 4 and 5 are dramatically continuous ; they are only separated 
scenically by the need for a slight change of locality. 

I. it is. So Qq., F2, 3; F i, 2 have is it 

8. Hamlet's speculative turn of mind is well illustrated in this 
passage. In the moment of nervous tension he finds a natural outlet 
in pursuing general reflections on an irrelevant matter, reflections 
which soon carry him into the deeps of philosophy. 



136 HAMLET. [Act I. 

g. the swaggering up-spring reels. Pope and Johnson lekned 
'up-spring' to Claudius, and interpreted it as 'upstart' or 'usurper'. 
It is more probably an epithet of ' reels ', the whole expression being 
governed by ' keeps '. Elze points out that the word corresponds 
to hiipfaiif, a wild German dance. There is a passage in Dekker's 
Gidls Horn-book worth quoting, "Teach me, thou sovereign 
skinker, how to take the German's upsy freeze, the Danish rousa ". 

11. The kettle-drum was a characteristically Danish instrument; 
cf. Cleveland, Fuscara or the Bee Errant — 

" Tuning his draughts with drowsy hums, 
As Danes carouse by kettle-drums ". 

12. his pledge. Cf. sc. 3, lines 124, sqq. 

15. The English appear to have shared, in Shakespeare's time, a 
reputation for tippling with the nations of northern Europe. The 
drunkenness of the Germans is satirized in Merchant of Venice, 
act i. scene 2, and it appears from contemporary records that the 
Danes came under the same condemnation; cf. Howell's Letters, 
i. 6. 2 (1632), "The king [Christian IV,] feasted my lord 
[Leicester] once, and it lasted from eleven of the clock till towards 
the evening, during which time the king began thirty-five healths". 

16. ' A custom which it is more honourable to break than to 
observe,' 

Lines 18-37 ai-e omitted in F i. 

ig. swinish phrase, phrase that makes us out to be swine, 

24. There is some irony in putting into Hamlet's mouth a truth 
which his own history is so notably to illustrate. It is ' by the 
o'ergrowth of some complexion ', that is, the natural tendency to 
over-speculation in him, that he comes to failure. 

32. nature's livery or fortune's star. Both phrases mean the 
same. The natural ' livery ', ' temperament ', or ' complexion ' of a 
man depends on the star he chanced to be born under. Cf. Much 
Ado, ii. I, 349, where Beatrice explains her lively nature, "Then 
there was a star danced, and under that was I born ". 

36, 37. These lines have puzzled commentators more than any other 
in the play. Furness, in his Varioru7n edition, devotes six pages to 
the criticism upon them, and the Cambridge editors enumerate some 
forty readings. 
The Q 2 text is — 

the dram of eale 
Doth all the noble substance of a doubt 
To his owne scandle. 

And the general sense is clearly, that a little leaven leavens the 
whole lump, a small fault brings scandal upon the whole of a noble 
character. But there can be little question that the Q 2 text is 



Scene 4.] NOTES. 137 

corrupt, and the wildest attempts have been made to emend it. It is 
hardly necessary for the purposes of this edition to catalogue these. 
They may be found in Furness, or in the Cambridge Shakespeare. 

No explanation appears to me plausible which does not retain 
the word eale. " A dram of eale " may mean — 

(i) A dram of a decoction of eels. Cf. Maplett, Green Forest 
(1567), quoted by Mr. W. M. Rossetti in Notes and Queries for 
October 30, 1869, "The eel being killed and addressed in wine, 
whosoever chaunceth to drinke of tliat wine so used shall ever after- 
wards lolhe wine ". 

(2) A dram of reproach. Mr. T. Davies states in Notes and 
Queries for March 11, 1876, that 'eale' in the sense of 'reproach 
is still used in the western counties. 

(3) Still more simply : a dram of e'il or evil. Very strong support 
is given to this interpretation by the Q 2 reading of dcale for ' devil ' 
in ii. 2. 627. 

Then for the next line. It is surely desirable to make the 
slightest possible change in the Q 2 text that will afford a reason- 
able sense. The choice appears to me to lie between two emenda- 
tions — 

( 1 ) Doth all the noble substance offer doubt. 

(2) Doth all the noble substance oft adoubt. 

In either case the meaning is the same, 'The dram of evil brings 
doubt upon the whole noble substance, lowering it to its own scan- 
dalous level'. The form 'adoubt' would be parallel to 'abase', 
the prefix giving it a causal sense. 

In view of the uncertainty of the question I have thought it best 
to let the Q 2 reading stand in the text. 

38. his, the ordinary possessive form both of 'he' and 'it' in 
Shakespeare. Cf. i. 2. 216, note, and Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 228. 

40. of health, in opposition to 'damned'; an angel or spirit 
from heaven. 

43. questionable shape, i.e. arousing obstinate questionings or 
problems in Hamlet's mind that need an answer. 

47. canonized, not ' sainted ', but ' buried according to the 
canon or ordinance of the church'. 

48. cerements. Q i has ceremojties. 

49. inurn'd. So F i; Q 2 has the more commonplace interred. 

54. fools of nature, the sport of nature. 

The construction is rather cramped. " What may this mean" is 
followed by {a) "that thou...revisit'st ", and {b) "to shake our dis- 
position": " We fools of nature" is explanatory of the "our". 

71. his. Cf. line 38, note. 

73. your sovereignty of reason. Possibly ' your sovereignty ' 
may be a courtier's phrase, like 'your highness'; but I think a 



138 HAMLET. [Act I. 

better sense is got by taking the whole phrase as equivalent to 
'reason, the sovereign quality in you'. Cf. i. 2. 1 10, " nobility of 
love". In that case 'deprive' is used in the rather exceptional 
sense of ' destroy '. 

Lines 75-78 are not in F I. The idea is further developed in 
King Lear^ act iv. sc. 6. 

83. the Nemean lion, one of the mythical monsters slain by 
Hercules. 

nerve. Elizabethan usage inverts the senses now given to ' nerve ' 
and 'sinew'. Cf. Glossary, s.v. 

Scene 5. 

2. My hour, i.e. the hour of cock-crow; cf. i. i. 147, sqq. 

11. to fast in fires. 'Fast' appears to be used here in the very 
general sense of undergoing penance. Various emendations have 
been suggested, such as to roast in fires ; to waste in fires ; to lasting 
fires. 

12. Cf. Vergil, Aeneid, vi. 739 — 

" Ergo exercentur poenis, veterumque malorum 
Supplicia expandunt. Aliae panduntur inanes 
Suspens3e ad ventos ; aliis sub gurgite vasto 
Infectum eluitur scelus, aut exuritur igni." 

17. Cf. Midsu7timer NigJWs Dream, ii. I. 153 — 

" And certain stars shot madly from their spheres 
To hear the sea-maid's music". 

19. an end, 'A' or 'an' appears to be often a dialectical form 
of ' on '. See Glossary, s.v. 

20. the fretful porpentine. The porpentine or porcupine was 
supposed to shoot out its quills, like arrows, when fretted. 

21. eternal blazon, revelation of the things belonging to eternity. 

30. This is Hamlet's first impulse before the natural reaction of 
his character sets in. The speech is full of irony, considering the 
course the play is to take. 

meditation. This does not seem to mean, as Warburton 
suggests, the mystical contemplation of God, or anything beyond 
'thought' in the ordinary sense. 'As quick as thought' is a 
common phrase enough. 

32. the fat v/eed. "If Shakespeare had any particular plant 
in mind, it must have been the asphodel, with its numerous bulbs, 
thick sown over the meadows of the lower regions." (Tschischwitz.) 
But the image seems rather to have been suggested by the heavy 
growth of shapeless weeds on wooden piles rising and falling with 
the motion of the water. 



Scene 5.] NOTES. 139 

33. roots. So Q 2 ; F I has rots. 

Lethe, a river or lake in the infernal regions of Greek mythology, 
whose waters gave forgetfulness of the past to those who drank. For 
the use of the substantive as an adjective of. i. 3. 133, note. 

40. Cf. i. 3. 256, ' I doubt some foul play '. 

42. Shakespeare does not fall into the error of making his villains 
obviously mean, after the fashion of melodrama. Unless they had 
the gifts and powers to accomplish their ends, their success would 
appear unconvincing, and the whole motive of the play hollow. 

46. seeming- virtuous. As to the extent of Gertrude's guilt see 
notes on act iii. sc. 4. 

47. Cf. iii. I. 53, sqq., and the use of the same idea in Tennyson's 
Locksley Hall — 

"Is it well to wish thee happy? — having known me — to decline 
On, a range of lower feelings and a narrower heart than mine!" 

53. The natural order is 'as virtue never will be moved'. It is 
altered, to bring out the antithesis of 'virtue' and ' lust'. 

56. sate. So F I ; Q 2 has sort. 

61. secure, in the sense of the Latin securiis, implying less 
security itself, than a sense of security which may be mistaken. 

62. cursed Hebona. So Q 2 ; F i has cursed hehenon. Hebona 
is generally supposed to be henbane {Hyoscyamus niger), which is a 
narcotic poison. Pliny {Nat. Hist. xxv. 4) states that the oil of it, 
dropped into the ears, stupefies the wits. On the other hand Dr. 
Brinsley Nicholson (New Sh. Soc. Transactions, 1880-2) argues that 
the plant meant is the yew. He shows that the name ebenus was 
applied to the yew; that Spenser's mention of "a heben bow" and 
"a heben lance" require a tough wood, and that, though the pro- 
perties of neither plant exactly correspond to Shakespeare's de- 
scription, the yew was supposed to curdle the blood, and so pro- 
duce a kind of leprosy. Marlowe speaks of " the juice of hebon ", 
but without showing which plant is meant. The ebenus or ebony 
is not poisonous. 

63. Ambroise Pare, a surgeon, was suspected of having poured 
poison into the ear of Francis II. when he was dressing it. 

73. The imperfect line allows a sufficient pause for Hamlet and 
the audieiice to realize the horror of the situation. 

75. dispatch'd, suddenly bereft. 

75. Cf. iii. 3. 81. 

77. disappointed. Shakespeare, like Milton, is fond of piling 
up these picturesque negative adjectives and participles. ' Dis- 
appointed ' is here used in its radical sense, ' not made ready ' ; cf. i. 
I. 154, note. Capell proposed to read unappointed, but the niore 



I40 HAMLET. [Act I. Scene 5. 

varied rhythm appears preferable. Pope's unanointed has the 
additional defect of being identical in meaning with ' unaneled ', 
which, however, Pope interpreted as ' without a knell being rung '. 

80. Many critics think that this line should be spoken by Hamlet, 
but all the Qq. Ff give it to the Ghost. 

go. uneffectual, either because it is lost in the rays of the sun, 
or, more probably, because it is light without heat. Cf Nash, The 
Unfortunate Traveller, ' ' The ostrich, the most burning-sighted bird 
of all others, insomuch as the female of them hatcheth not her eggs 
by covering them, but by the effectual rays of her eyes ". 

97, this distracted globe. It is the stage tradition for the actor 
to put his hand to his head at these words. 

98. " Shakespeare alone could have produced the vow of Hamlet 
to make his memory a blank of all maxims and generalized truths, 
that 'observation had copied there' — followed immediately by the 
speaker noting down the generalized fact, line 108." (Coleridge.) 

105. Hamlet, already revolted by his mother's marriage, assumes, 
as indeed the Ghost appears to do in line 85, that she had a share in 
the greater crime. 

107. tables, writing tablets of slate or ivory, often made in the 
form of a book, with clasps. They were perhaps covered with wax, 
and written on with a sharp-pointed instrument. 

Hamlet's action is symbolical of the scholar and philosopher^ not 
the man of deeds. 

112. I cannot help thinking that some of the rude humour in the 
latter part of this scene is a survival from the older play, and was 
retained to please the groundlings. It can, of course, be treated as 
having a dramatic value. It affords an outlet for Hamlet's excite- 
ment, and belongs to the exalted state of mind in which he con- 
ceives the idea of pretending madness. This scheme has plainly 
been formed by line 171. 

The distribution of the speeches is that of Q 2 ; that of F i differs 
slightly. 

116. Hamlet parodies Horatio's call, by imitating that of a 
falconer to his hawk. 

124. Hamlet is on the point of saying 'but the king', when his 
heart fails him, and he ingeniously turns off the sentence. 

136. S. Patrick, according to Moberly the patron saint of 
blunders and confusion, and therefore fitly invoked when ' the times 
were out of joint'. Or he may be thought of as concerned with un- 
expiated crime. Cf. Dekker, The Honest Whore, "S. Patrick, you 
know, keeps Purgatory ". 

there is, not in Hamlet's words, but in Claudius' deeds. 



Act II. Scene i.J NOTES. 141 

138. an honest ghost, not a devil in his father's shape, as both 
Horatio and himself have thought possible. Yet this very doubt 
recurs in ii. 2. 580. 

148. Most European nations swore by the sword, in heathen 
times by the edge, in Christian by the cross hilt. 

156, Hie et ubique. Shakespeare rarely introduces Latin words 
in ordinary dialogue, which makes it the more likely that this scene 
contains fragments of an older play. 

167. our. So F I ; Q 2 has yoi^f. 

174. One of the many lines which Shakespeare, as a practical 
playwright, leaves to be interpreted by the actor. 

189. Hamlet's lurking sense of his own ineffectiveness bursts out 
in these lines. 

The events of act i. are more or less continuous, from twelve 
o'clock on one night to dawn on the next. An interval follows, as 
to the length of which see note on act ii. sc, 2 ad Jin. 

Act II.— Scene I. 

Act i. has been a sort of prologue ; it contains the possibilities of 
which the remaining Acts show the tragic development. As usual 
with Shakespeare, there is a crisis or turning-point at about the 
middle of the play, in the scene where Hamlet has a definite oppor- 
tunity of killing the king and misses it (act iii. scene 3). Up to 
that point we are concerned with the Cause of the tragedy, the 
action and reaction of the Ghost's injunction and Hamlet's character 
upon each other, the puttings off, the assumed madness. After that, 
follows the Effect ; the successive fatal consequences due to that one 
cause are unrolled before us. 

The first part of scene I is chiefly important as showing us at 
once that a considerable interval has elapsed. Laertes has had time 
to reach Paris and make friends there. It leads up to the more 
important question, 'What has become of Hamlet during the 
interval? Is Claudius dead yet?' 

The stage-direction of the text is that of F I. Q 2 has £nter old 
Polonins with his man or two. This is interesting, because the 
words "-with his man or too'' look like an attempt to make sense of 
the name Montana, which was apparently left in the MS. side by 
side with the substituted Reynaldo. Q 1 has Enter Corambis and 
Montaito. Cf. i. 2. i, note, and Appendix A. 

7. Danskers. 'Danske' is a common variant for 'Denmark'. 

10. encompassment and drift, roundabout and gradual course ; 
cf. the phrase 'to fetch a compass'. 

11. more nearer. The double comparative is not infrequent in 
Shakespeare; cf. iii. 2. 316; iii. 4. 167; v. 2. 119. 



142 HAMLET. [Act II. 

The thought is, ' You will get nearer by indirect than direct 
questions '. Polonius characteristically repeats this in other words 
in lines 65, 66. 

17. The exactness and minuteness of Polonius' instructions is 
another sign of his self-conceit. He will leave nothing to the com- 
mon-sense of'his agent. 

20. forgeries, in the general sense of ' false attributions '. 

28. This speech shows at once the lowness of Polonius' moral 
tone and the futility of his intellect, with its love of nice and mean- 
ingless distinctions. 

35. Of general assault. Dyce explains this as ' common to all 
young men'. But I think 'a savageness...of general assault' may 
also mean ' a passionate desire to assail all kinds of experience'. 

38. a fetch of warrant. So F i ; Q 2 has a fetch of zvit. A 
warranted or approved device. 

39. sullies. So F I; but Q 2 has sallies; cf. i. 2. 129, note. 

41. Here Polonius nods wisely, and beckons with his forefinger 
to fill up the line. 

45. in this consequence, with such words as follow. 
50. Polonius' memory is something senile. 

59. Is there an allusion here to the famous quarrel in a tennis- 
court between Sir Philip Sidney and the Earl of Oxford? 

64. of reach is explained by i. 4. 56, "thoughts beyond the 
reaches of our souls ". 

65. assays of bias, attempts that resemble the curved round- 
about course of a bowl ; cf Glossary, s.v. bias. 

68. have me, understand me. 

71. in yourself, personally, as well as by the report of others. 

73. ' Let him go his own way without interference.' 

74. Hamlet has not yet accomplished his purpose of revenge. The 
assumption of madness gives him time to consider the subject on 
every side, and the process fascinates him. One element in the 
situation is his utter solitariness ; he needs the help of spiritual 
sympathy if he is to brace himself to the required effort. But where 
is it to come from? He turns naturally to his love Ophelia; yet he 
knows, in his heart that she is not strong enough to give him what 
he wants. He makes one last attempt to disabuse himself of this 
impression, but her eyes only confirm it, and he reluctantly quits 
her for ever. 

85. Hamlet is already regarded as mad in the court; the only 
question is, the reason? Polonius now jumps to the conclusion — 
through love. The disorder of Hamlet's attire, which may have 
been due either to intention or to preoccupation, also presents itself 



Scene 2.] NOTES. 143 

as a symptom of love-sickness; cf. As Yoii Like It, iii, 2. 297, "your 
hose should be ungartered, your bonnet unhanded, your sleeve un- 
buttoned, your shoe untied, and everything about you demonstrating 
a careless desolation ". 

102. the very ecstasy, precisely the ecstasy. 

103. fordoes, destroys. 'For' has the negative sense of 'to 
one's hurt', common in the German ver. 

108. Cf. i. 3. 122. 

114. This again must be taken as irony. Polonius is falling 
into this error even while he comments on it; cf. i. 5. 98, note. 

118, iig. The expression is obscure. Probably Polonius is think- 
ing of himself. His words seem to mean, ' If I make Hamlet's 
love for my daughter known, it may bring dislike on me; but 
probably, on the whole, more trouble would come out of keeping it 
dark'. 

Scene 2. 

This long scene contains two main dramatic motives. In the latter 
part of it, from the entry of the players, we get the gradual approach 
to that crisis of the action which is brought about by the play-scene. 
The rest gives us, so to speak, a summary of the mental condition of 
Hamlet and of his attitude to the court during the months of delay. 
The points to notice are: (i) the assumption of madness, which de- 
ceives Gertrude, Ophelia, Polonius, Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, though 
the king, who has a better key to Hamlet's behaviour than any of 
these, is not without his suspicions; (2) the delight which Hamlet 
takes in the opportunity thus afforded him of pouring irony upon his 
enemies, and especially upon Polonius; (3) his invariable tendency 
to pass from the consideration of his own position into general satii^e 
and invective upon society. It is to be observed that Hamlet is not 
always acting the madman; he only does so, for instance, with 
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, when he begins to suspect their good 
fai-th. And further, the pretence is easy to him. It only requires 
a slight exaggeration of his natural self. His thoughts and feelings, 
especially under conditions of nervous excitement, are always on a 
plane hardly intelligible to ordinary men. To appear mad he has 
only to relax the control which he normally keeps over them. 

Rosencrantz and Gziildenstern. Q i has Rossencraft and Gilder- 
stone. The names are Danish ; they occur as those of Danish 
students at Padua in 1587-9 and 1603 respectively, and a Danish 
courtier called Rosencrantz attended the coronation of James I. 

2. Moreover that, besides the fact that ; an unusual sense. 

6. Since, So F i here and in line 13. Q 2 has the old-er form 
Sith in both cases. 



144 HAMLET. [Act II. 

11. of, applied to time, frequently takes the place of 'from'; cf. 
Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 167. 

12. humour. So F i ; Q 2 has havioiir. 

34. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are utterly commonplace men. 
The interchange of their names here is a subtle hint of their 
nonentity. They have been friends of Hamlet, superficially (lines 
19, 228, 277), but they are not upon the same ethical or intellectual 
level as he is. 

40. The introduction here of the Norway theme serves a double 
purpose. It marks the lapse of time since act i. sc. 2 (see note at 
end of this scene), and it again calls to our attention the need for a 
strong hand in Denmark, emphasized already in act i. sc. i. This is 
done at intervals throughout the play. 

42. The self-conceit of Polonius is only equalled by his effusive 
loyalty — to an usurper. 

still, novi? as ever. 

47. Polonius' statesmanship — a cunning both vulgar and shallow^ 
— is the point on which above all others he prides himself. 

52. the fruit. So Q 2; F i has the news, of which Hunter would 
make the nuts, in the sense of 'It will be nuts to him' (I). The meta- 
phor is only from the dessert, which comes after a feast. 

56. the main, the obvious dominant fact in her life and that of 
her son. 

57. There is no sign here that Gertrude knows anything of the 
nature of King Hamlet's death. 

61. Upon our first, directly he had heard us. 

67. borne in hand, handled, treated; cf. Macbeth, iii. i. 81, 
*How you were borne in hand'. 

73. three thousand. So F i ; Q 2 has three-score thousand, but 
the F I reading is supported by the scansion and by Q i. 

81. more consider'd time, time more fit for consideration. 
Passive participles are often used in senses that are not exactly 
passive; cf. Abbott, Sh. Gr. §374. 

90. Again the irony of making a man utter his own condemnation. 

98. figure, in the sense of rhetorical device. 

log. This letter is no doubt a genuine love-letter of Hamlet's, 
written before the opening of the play, and before Ophelia had been 
instructed by her father to 'repel his letters' (i. 3. 122; ii. i. 109). 
The terminology of it is no sign of madness. Love-letters have at 
all times been written in a nice and exalted vein ; with an Elizabethan 
this would naturally result in such affectations and conceits as the 
Euphuists and Sir Philip Sidney had rendered popular. But to 



Scene 2.} NOTES. 145 

those who are not in love, love's language may well appear ridiculous 
or even insane. Cf. Midsiumner Night'' s Dream, v. i. 7 — 
"The lunatic, the lover, and the poet 
Are of imagination all compact". 

no; beautified, a fantastic variant for 'beautiful'; cf. Nash's 
dedication of Christ'' s Tears over Jerusalem (1594), "To the most 
beautified lady, the Lady Elizabeth Carey". 

III. It is one of Polonius' absurdities to fancy himself a connoisseur 
of literature and the drama. His is one of those character-parts 
which gain incredibly by the voice and gesture of the actor. 

113. "Women anciently had a pocket in the fore part of their 
stays, in which they not only carried love-letters and love-tokens, 
but even their money and their materials for needle- work." 
(Steevens.) 

123. this machine, his earthly body. 

135. table-book, note-book, the 'tables' of i. 5. 107. The idea 
is, 'If I had kept their secret as closely as a desk or table-book 
would have kept letters intrusted to them'. 

139, round, not 'circuitously' but 'directly', 'straight out'; the 
common sense of 'roundly'; cf. As You Like It, v. 3. 11, "Shall 
we clap into it roundly, without hawking or spitting, or saying we are 
hoarse". 

141. out of thy star. The idea is that persons in different ranks 
in life ai^e under the influence of different stars, and therefore, like 
them, belong to different spheres; cf. Twelfth Night, ii. 5. 156, "in 
my stars I am above thee". 

146-50. Considering that Hamlet was never mad, this chronicle of 
the stages of his malady is exquisite. 

160. four hours. This is the reading of all the Qq. Ff. ; at the 
same time I think that Hanmer's conjecture for hours is probably 
right. 

167. The queen alone has any sympathy for Hamlet, whether in 
his love (line 1 14) or in his madness. 

171. There is nothing corresponding to the remainder of this scene 
in the same place in Q I, but a good deal of the matter follows 
the scene that corresponds to our act iii. sc. I. Hamlet's dislike of 
Polonius is very marked ; as the father of his love Ophelia, as the 
courtier of his uncle, as a man of the world, and as a fool, he is dis- 
pleasing to the prince in every aspect, 

174, a fishmonger. This taunt is purposely obscure, and con- 
veys no meaning to Polonius. There are two possible explanations 
of what Hamlet may have intended by it. Coleridge gives one : 
"That is, you are sent to fish out my secret". Or 'fishmonger' may 
be used in a sense which it appears sometimes to bear, of a seller of 
(885) K 



146 HAMLET. [Act II. 

women's chastity. Here and in lines 182 sqq., Hamlet seems to 
suggest that Polonius would willingly make a market of his daughter. 

181. Hamlet is still harping on Ophelia, so his irrelevance is not 
so great as it appears. Just as life comes out of carrion, so may she 
be the child of Polonius. 

182. a god kissing carrion. Both Q 2 and F i read a good 
kissing carrion ; the emendation is Warburton's. It may be justified 
by I Henry IV. ii. 4. 1 13, " Didst thou never see Titan kiss a dish 
of butter?" and Edward III. (1596)— 

" The freshest summer's day doth sooner taint 
The loathed carrion that it seems to kiss". 

If the reading of the Qq. Ff. is retained, the interpretation must be, 
' If the sun can breed maggots of a dead dog, what will become of 
Ophelia? She too is 'good kissing carrion' {i.e. 'carrion good to 
kiss'). 'Therefore let her not walk i' the sun.' 

185. i' the sun, in the sunshine of princely favours; cf. i. 2. 67. 

195. There is no reason to find an allusion here to Juvenal, Satire 
X. 188, as Englished by Sir John Beaumont, or to any book in par- 
ticular. Hamlet is clearly extemporizing on Polonius' peculiarities. 

214. The words and suddenly .. .between him are left out in Q 2: 
probably it is an accidental omission. 

221. Hamlet's transitions from banter to seriousness are frequent 
and pathetic. The effect, however, would be all the same upon his 
hearers. 

Lines 244-274 {24^-2yj) occur in F I, but not in Q 2. 

256 [2^4). One of the startling sayings, which make one feel that 
Shakespeare has sounded the heights and depths of all philosophies. 

262. bad dreams, the vision of his father, forcing him out of his 
favourite life of imagination and philosophy into the uncongenial 
world of action. 

270. outstretched. "Hamlet is thinking of the strutting stage 
heroes." (Delius.) 

Hamlet 'cannot reason'. The paradox he puts forward in this 
speech is not intended to suffer analysis. 

276. dreadfully attended, not merely by his servants, but by his 
own ' bad dreams '. 

277. in the beaten way of friendship, without ceremony, 
speaking as friend to friend. 

280 {277). Cf. i. 5. 185. 

282. too dear a halfpenny, too dear at a halfpenny, valueless. 
For the omission of 'at' the Clarendon Press editors quote Chaucer, 
Canterbury Tales, 8875, "dere y-nough a jane"; and 12723, "dere 
y-nough a leeke ". 



Scene 2.] NOTES. 147 

Hamlet has not been playing the madman up to this point. He 
is unfeignedly glad to see his friends, and takes pleasure in a wit- 
combat with them. Suddenly his suspicions are aroused, and con- 
firmed by their shuffling. He at once glides into an extravagance of 
speech, which easily convinces them of his insanity. 

304 &c. There is nothing really mad in this speech of Hamlet's, it 
is the natural expression of his pessimistic mood; but to theunphilo- 
sophical mind — the plain man — all views of life that go in the least 
beneath the surface will appear lunacy. 

322 (j/c?), Hamlet's thoughts are always returning to Ophelia. 

329. lenten. Lent being a fast, 'lenten' is the reverse of joyous 
or festive. 

332. Hamlet's love of the drama is characteristic of his literary 
temperament. Shakespeare uses this episode of the players to intro- 
duce a certain amount of — ^what is unusual with him — topical allusion 
to the fortunes of his company, and to vexed questions of dramatic 
controversy. We need not assume that all the literary criticism put 
in Hamlet's mouth represents Shakespeare's own opinions. It may 
rather be that which would belong to the point of view of a scholar 
and courtier, such, for instance, as we find in Sir Philip Sidney's 
Apologie for Poetrie. 

The players, hovs^ever, are not merely incidental ; they have a share 
in the working out of the plot. Their coming suggests to Hamlet a 
plan by which he may apply a crucial test to the king, and settle at 
once all doubts as to the ghost's revelation. 

335. the humorous man, the character part of the piece. Cf. 
the title-page of Merry Wives, Q 3, ' The Merry Wives of Windsor, 
with the humours of Sir John Fal^taff\ Jonson's comedies, Every 
Man in his Humour, Every Man out of his Humour, &c., are full of 
such character studies. 

337. tickle o' the sere. F i has tickled a th^ sere. The words 
the clown .. .sere are omitted in Q 2. The phrase occurs in Howard's 
Defensative against the poison of supposed prophecies (1620), "Dis- 
covering the moods and humours of the vulgar sort to be so loose 
and tickle of the sere". The meaning is pretty obvious — 'easily 
moved to laughter', but how is it arrived at? Perhaps the metaphor 
is from a 'sere' or 'dry' throat, which is easily tickled. An ingenious 
explanation is given by Dr. Nicholson in Notes and Queries for July 22, 
1 87 1. A 'sere' or 'sear' is part of the mechanism of a trigger. 
Halliwell quotes in his Archaic Dictionary from Lombard (1596), 
" Even as a pistol that is ready charged and bent will fly off by and 
by, if a man do but touch the scare". Thus "tickle o' the sere" 
means ' ready to go off at once', like a hair-trigger. 

338. 'The lady shall say her mind, even if she has to say more 
than is set down for her, and so spoils the blank verse.' 



148 HAMLET. [Act II. 

343-347. On the 'travelling', the 'inhibition', the 'innovation', 
see Introduction, p. 15, and Appendix D. 

Lines 352-379 occur in F i, but not in Q 2. 

354-358. On the 'aery of children' and the 'berattling of the 
common stages', see Introduction, p. 15, and Appendix D. 

355- cry out... question. This is generally interpreted as 'cry 
out in a high childish treble ' or ' cry out, dominating convei-sation '. 
I believe it really means, ' cry out on the burning question of the 
day, the question that is at the top, most prominent '. 

359. afraid of goose-quills, afraid of being satirized. 

363. the quality, the profession of actors. 

366. if their means are no better. This phrase seems to support 
the belief that the profession of an actor vi^as looked on with some 
contempt, even by literary men, Shakespeare is supposed to refer 
to this in Sonnet cxi. — 

" O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide. 
The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds. 
That did not better for my life provide 
Than public means which public manners breeds. 
Thence comes it that my name receives a brand ", &c. 

378. Hercules and his load, perhaps an allusion to the sign of 
the Globe Theatre, Hercules bearing the world for Atlas. 

381. Hamlet quotes the case of his uncle as another instance of the 
change of fashion. His choice of an illustration shows the preoccu- 
pation of his thoughts. 

383. his picture in little. Does this mean a miniature, or his 
picture on a coin? 

396. I am but mad north-north-west, I am only mad when 
the wind is in one point of the compass, only touched with madness. 

397. a handsaw. So Q 2, F i. Hanmer proposed hernshaiv, or 
' heron ', but the phrase as spelt in the text is proverbial. But very 
likely ' handsaw ' may be a corruption of ' heronshaw '. Authorities 
on falconry say that the birds fly with the wind, and therefore, when 
it is from the south, the sportsman would have his back to the sun 
and be able to distinguish them without being dazzled. ' Hawk ', 
however, is said to be a name given to a kind of tool used by 
plasterers. 

406. o' Monday morning. I do not think there is any special 
point in this phrase. Hamlet affects to be talking of indifferent 
matters, that Polonius may not think any attention has been paid to 
his approach. 

410. Hamlet maliciously spoils the effect of Polonius' announce- 
ment by being the first to speak of actors. 



Scene 2.] NOTES. 149 

412. Buz, buz, according to Blackstone an interjection used at 
Oxford, equivalent to ' Stale news!' 

414. i.e. 'Have they come 'upon your honour'? Then your 
honour is — an ass.' 

416. A satire on the numerous subdivisions of the drama. The 
licence given to the King's Company in 1603 entitles them "freely to 
use and exeixise the art and faculty of playing Comedies, Tragedies, 
Histories, Enterludes, Moralls, Pastoralls, Stage plays, and such 
other like". 

418. scene individable, or poem unlimited, Delius explains 
these as referring respectively to plays that observed and that dis- 
regarded the Unity of Place. 

419. 420. Seneca was the fashionable Latin model for tragedy, 
Plautus for comedy; Shakespeare's Comedy of Eri'ors is based upon 
the Menaechmi of Plautus. A translation of this play by Warner 
appeared in 1595. Ail the plays of Seneca had been translated by 
1 58 1. The Inflitence of Seneca on Elizabethan Tragedy is the title of 
an interesting book by Dr. J. Cunliffe. 

420. Plautus. Q I has the curious reading Plato. 

the law of writ and the liberty. This again means pieces 
written according to rules and without rules, ' classical ' and ' ro- 
mantic ' dramas. Collier, however, explains it ' written and extem- 
porized plays '. 

422. Jephthah had a daughter, and was ready to sacrifice her, as 
Polonius would Ophelia; cf. line 174, note. 

426. A ballad &rv\\\\.&^ Jesphas Dowgther at his death was entered 
on the Stationers' Register in 1567-8, and another, or perhaps the 
same, en\.\t\Q.(l Jepha Jtidge of Israel in 1624. Various forms are in 
existence ; in one the first stanza runs as follows : — 

" I red that many years ago, 
When Jepha Judge of Israel, 
Had one fair daughter and no more. 

Whom he loved so passing well. 
And as by lot God wot. 
It came to pass so like it was, 
Great war there should be. 

And who should be the chief, but he, but he". 

In 1602 a drama was written for Henslowe on the same subject by 
Dekker and Chettle. 

438. the first row... chanson. So Q2, and the reading is sup- 
ported and explained by that of Q I, the first verse of the godly ballet. 
F I, however, has Pons Chanson, explained by Hunter as equivalent 
to chanson du pont neuf ' a popular ballad '. 



I50 HAMLET. [Act II. 

439. my abridgement, the players, who are "the abstract and 
brief chronicles of the time " (line 548). But Hamlet may also mean 
that the coming of the players cuts short or abridges his discourse ; 
or again, that they serve as an entertainment to abridge or while 
away the time. Cf. Midsununei' Night's Dream, v. I. 39, " Say, 
what abridgement have you for this evening?" 

442. valanced, with a beard. This is the Q 2 reading ; F i has 
valiant. 

445. It should be remembered that on the Elizabethan stage female 
parts were taken by boys. 

448. cracked within the ring. " There was a ring on the coin, 
within which the sovereign's head was placed; if the crack extended 
from the edge beyond this ring, the coin was rendered unfit for 
currency." (Douce.) 

450. The French appear to have had an unenviable reputation as 
sportsmen, of pursuing all birds, and not only the nobler game. 

454 {452)- me, the ethic dative, introducing a person interested in 
the action of the verb; cf. ii. i. 6, and Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 220. 

457. caviare, a Russian delicacy, made of sturgeons' roes. 

the general, the multitude. 

The phrase may be illustrated by a quotation from Nicholas Breton's 
The Courtier and the Countryman (1597): "Another of the fine 
dishes... was a little barrel of caviary; which was no sooner opened 
and tasted, but quickly made up again, and was sent back with this 
message : ' Commend me to my good lady, and thank her honour, 
and tell her we have black soap enough already ; but if it be any 
better thing, I beseech her ladyship to bestow it upon a better friend 
that can better tell how to use it '. Now if such be your fine dishes, 
I pray you let me alone with my country fare." 

459. in the top of mine, with greater authority than mine. 

460. well digested in the scenes, the scenes carefully arranged 
to advance the plot. 

461. modesty, correctness, propriety, the opposite of extrava- 
gance, a common sense of the Latin modestia. 

466. by very much more handsome than fine, i.e. its beauty 
was not that of elaborate ornament, but that of order and proportion. 

468. iEneas' tale to Dido, There are many critical difficulties 
in understanding exactly what Shakespeare meant by this recitation 
episode ; but they can only be briefly touched on here. 

To begin with, there can be no doubt that Hamlet, at least, does 
not quote the lines in irony ; they are not, to him, mere burlesque. 
The speech which introduces them is clearly intended for serious 
criticism, and, moreover, if they were burlesque, the point of the 



Scene 2.] NOTES. 151 

episode in leading up to Hamlet's comparison of himself with the 
player (lines 576, sqq. ) would be dulled. Nevertheless, the lines as 
they stand do read to me as the most absolute burlesque. Compare 
them with the passage, with whicli they were obviously meant to 
challenge comparison, the tale of Aeneas to Dido in Marlowe and 
N ash.' s Dido, Queen of Carthage, ii. I. 214, sqq. (Cf. Appendix E. ) 
The work of the earlier writer is inflated enough, but surely Shake- 
speare, with his ' coagulate gore ' and his ' eyes like carbuncles ', 
excels him in bombast and extravagance. I am aware that this is 
not the view of all critics, and it is opposed to the high aesthetic 
authority of Coleridge, who writes: "The fancy that a burlesque 
was intended sinks below criticism ; the lines, as epic narrative, are 
superb". Perhaps Schlegel's explanation is the true one, that the 
bombast is necessary to a play within a play. He says : " This ex- 
tract must not be judged of by itself, but in connection with the place 
where it is introduced. To distinguish it as dramatic poetry in the 
play itself, it was necessary that it should rise above its dignified 
poetry in the same proportion that the theatrical elevation does above 
simple nature." Or perhaps we must not confuse Shakespeare with 
Hamlet; the actor- playwright, the xoxi\z.Xi\\.z\'sA. par excellence, maybe 
gently satirizing the point of view of the university and court wit and 
scholar, with his ' law of writ ', his unities and classical models. But 
there are further difficulties in this explanation. It agrees well enough 
with the criticism which is put into Hamlet's mouth. The play is 
said to be characterized by order and proportion, "well digested in 
the scenes ", free from irrelevancies and affectations, and therefore 
"caviare to the general". This is exactly what might be said of 
any ' classical ' play, such as Ferrex and Porrex. But when we 
come to the speech itself, all this is forgotten. The style is that of 
an early turgid romantic play, full of affectations, and indeed the 
play of Dido, Queen of Carthage, which it imitates, is essentially 
romantic and not classical in character. So that it is impossible to 
say that any quite satisfactory solution of the difficulty has been 
arrived at. 

472. the Hyrcanian beast, the tiger; an obvious reference to 
Virgil, Aeneid, iv. 266 — 

' ' duris genuit te cautibus horrens 
Caucasus, Hyrcanaeque admorunt ubera tigres". 

492. Rebellious to his arm. Does this explain the sense of 
Macbeth, i. 2. 56, "Point against point rebellious"? 

495. This line affords the nearest verbal parallel between this 
passage and the corresponding one in Dido, Queen of Carthage-, cf. 
that play, ii. i. 254 — 

' ' Which he disdaining, whisked his sword about. 
And with the wind thereof the king fell down". 

Mr. Fleay suggested in Macmillan' s Magazine for Dec. 1874, that 
this scene was one of Nash's additions to Marlowe's play, and that 



152 HAMLET. [Act II. 

Shakespeare wrote his speech in rivalry. In a later work, however, 
he assigns the scene to Marlowe. 

496. The last three lines are represented by a blank in Q 2. 

502. a painted tyrant, a tyrant in a picture. 

503. ' Indifferent to his own will and the matter he had in hand. 

517. fellies. Q 2 h.Q.s follies, F i /allies. 

522. a jig, a humorous performance by a clown, given after the fall 
of the curtain. It included music, dancing, and coarse humour, and 
probably resembled some of the ' turns' at a modern music-hall more 
than anything else. The titles of jigs by Kempe and others occur 
in the Stationers' Registers. 

525, 526. mobled. So Q 2 ; F i has inobled. 

527. Polonius is rather bored, but he thinks* it well to interpolate 
a criticism, in order to keep up his character as a judge of literature. 
The criticism is rather an unfortunate one, however. 

531. o'er-teemed, worn out with bearing children. 

540. Dryden did not know that 'milch' only meant 'moist', and 
wrote of this passage in the preface to his Troihcs and Cressida, 
" His making milch the burning eyes of heaven was a pretty toler- 
able flight too; and I think no man ever drew milk out of eyes 
before him". 

541. passion, like 'milch', is governed by 'made'. 

549. Cf. line 439, note. 

550. This line, like line 359, appears to show that personal satire 
was a considerable feature of the Elizabethan stage. 

564. a speech of some dozen or sixteen lines. There is 
a mare's-nest controversy on these lines in the Transactions of the 
New Shakspere Society for 1874. I have no doubt that they are 
to be found in Lucianus' speech (iii. 2. 266, sqq.). They are inter- 
rupted by the king's sudden rising. Others think that they are to 
be found in the Player King's speech (iii. 2. 196, sqq.), because this 
speech is philosophical and therefore characteristic of Hamlet. But 
the only object of altering the play could be to introduce a scene 
exactly parallel to Claudius' crime. 

570. The suggestion that the player could only refrain from mock- 
ing Polonius out of courtesy to Hamlet is delicious. 

576. Hamlet has been smitten by the player's emotion, obvious 
even to Polonius (line 542), into a consciousness of his own weakness. 
As a student of the drama he is aware of the profound influence of 
acting upon the minds of the spectators. Hitherto he has been, so 
he thinks, deterred from action by doubts as to the genuineness of 
the ghost. Now he makes the play, altered for the purpose, a test 
of the king's guilt, — and then, no more hesitation. 



Scene 2.] NOTES. 153 

580. wann'd. So Q 2 ; F i has warni'd. 

584. The pauses m this speech (cf. lines 593, 603, 610, 616) are 
filled up by intervals of meditation. 

595. John - a - dreams. The word recurs in Armin's Nest of 
Ninnies (1608), "His name is John, indeed, says the cynic; but 
neither John-a-nods, nor John-a-dreams, yet either as you take it". 

601. Cf. Richard II. i. I. 44, "With a foul traitor's name stuft 
I thy throat"; and i. I. 124 — 

"as low as to thy heart, 
through the false passage of thy throat, thou liest". 

605. For the belief that pigeons were gentle because they had no 
gall cf. Drayton, Eclogue Ix. — 

*' a milk-white dove 
About whose neck was in a collar wrought 
Only like me my mistress hath no gall". 

617. About, about it, to business. 

627. This was a common explanation of the supernatural. It is 
that put forward in James the First's Demonologie, and is found also 
in SirT, Browne's A'e'/^^/f Medici: "I believe... that these apparitions 
and ghosts of departed persons are not the wandering souls of men, 
but the unquiet walks of devils, prompting and suggesting unto us 
murder blood and villainy, instilling and stealing into our hearts, 
that the blessed spirits are not at rest in their graves, but wander 
solicitous of the affairs of the world". 

631. such spirits, such humours, as melancholy. 

633. More relative, more closely related, more definite. 

this, i.e. the story of the ghost. Hamlet has taken out his 
tablets to compose the 'dozen or sixteen lines'; in these same tablets 
he has written his note after the ghost's departure (i. 5. 109), and he 
now taps them significantly. He is happy now, for he can put off 
his whole problem, with a good conscience, until the result of his 
congenial device is made clear. 

An interval of at least a month has elapsed between acts i. and ii. 
There has been time for Laertes to reach France and want fresh 
supplies (ii. I. i), for the ambassadors to return from Norway (ii. 2. 
40), for Hamlet's reputation for madness to be established, and for 
Rosencrantz and Guildenstei-n to be sent for (ii. 2. 3). Cf. also iii. 2. 
136 and note ad loc. with i. 2. 147. From the beginning of act ii. 
the action is fairly continuous to the end of act iv. sc. 3. Act iii. 
sc. 2 is on the 'morrow night' to act ii. sc. 2 (ii. 2. 563), and act iii. 
sc. I is doubtless on the morrow morning. It will be remembered 
that Mr. Rose has shown reason for supposing that act iii. sc. i is 
really part of act ii. 



154 HAMLET. [Act III. 

Act III.— Scene I. 

This short scene sums up the precise situation of affairs at the 
moment when the crisis is coming on. There are tliree points to be 
noticed. 

(i) Hamlet has resolved to make the play the solution of all his 
doubts; if that test shows the king guilty, he shall die. Even as 
he forms this determination, his heart fails him. He turns to an 
alternative which has dimly presented itself before (i. 2. 132), and 
deliberately considers the desirability of suicide. But such a way 
out of the difficulty is too simple, too easy for his over-speculative 
nature. He sees the future filled with countless possibilities, which 
puzzle his will, and this enterprise also loses the name of action. 

(2) Hamlet has long known that no help is to be had from 
Ophelia. Yet when she appears before him, his old tenderness 
revives. He speaks gently to her, and then — discovers that she is 
deceiving him, acting as a decoy for Polonius. This obliges him 
to play the madman again, and his paradoxes express a feeling of 
revulsion from the poor foolish girl. His mother's sin has already 
made him lose faith, in womanhood, and now he sees Ophelia, 
too, spotted with all the vileness of her sex. He assails her with 
reproaches so inappropriate to herself that she can only take them 
as the sign of a shattered mind. 

(3) With Polonius and the like Hamlet's acting is successful; 
but the king is shrewder. His suspicions are awaked, and he at 
once plots to get his nephew out of the way. Hamlet has, there- 
fore, gone too far on the path of delay, and though he does not 
know it, the opportunities of revenge are fast slipping away from him. 

I. drift of circumstance, roundabout methods; cf. i. 5. 127; 
ii. I. 10. 

5. Cf. ii. 2. 304. 

13. This hardly appears to give a fair account of what really 
took place, unless indeed we accept Clarke's somewhat strained 
interpretation ' He was sparing in speech, when we questioned him ; 
but of demands respecting ourselves he was very free in return'. 
Warburton proposed to read — 

Most free in question, but of our demands 
Niggard in his reply. 

32, The phrase lawful espials is not found in Q 2. 

43. Polonius and the king hide behind an arras. The book 
given to Ophelia is doubtless a prayer-book; cf. the following lines 
and the word ' orisons ' in line 89. 

46. Here again the truth of Polonius' words affords an ironical 
contrast to the meanness of his actions. 

49. This speech is the first hint of any sting of conscience in 
Claudius; cf. act iii. sc. 3. 



Scene i.] NOTES. 155 

52. the thing that helps it, the waiting-maid; cf. the well- 
known saying, ' No man is a hero to his valet-de-cha7nbre\ 

Lines 57, 58 are an expansion of the idea ' to be'; lines 59, 60 of 
' not to be '. Hamlet may propose to take arms either by attacking 
the king, and so exposing himself to probable death, or, more 
likely, by killing himself. The metaphor contained in "take arms 
against a sea of troubles" has been criticised as being confused and 
absurd; hut the difficulty, if there is any, disappears when it is 
shown that there is an allusion to a custom attributed to the Kelts by 
many classical writers. Shakespeare may have read of it in Aristotle 
or Strabo or Nicolas Damascenus, but most probably in Abraham 
Fleming's translation of K^^vaxi^ Histories (1576), book xii. : " Some 
of them are so bold, or rather desperate, that they throw them- 
selves into the foaming floods with their swords drawn in their 
hands, and shaking their javelins, as though they were of force and 
violence to withstand the rough waves, to resist the strength of the 
stream, and to make the floods afraid lest they should be wounded 
with their weapons ". 

61. to say, Bailey objected to these words as breaking the 
sense, and proposed straightway. But I think they are meant as a 
hint that it is not a real end. 

67. this mortal coil. ' Coil ' generally means ' turmoil ' ; cf. 
Glossary, s.v.\ but it is often explained here as 'body', and the 
phrase is compared to Merchant of Venice, v. i. 64, "this muddy 
vesture of decay ", and to Beaumont and Fletcher's Bondiica, iv. 4, 
"the case of flesh". The body is conceived of as wound round 
the soul like a coil of rope. Various editors have suggested clay, 
soil, veil, spoil ( = ' slough '). 

6g. of so long life, so long lived. 

70. the whips and scorns of time, i.e. of the temporal world. 
In Armin's Nest of Ninnies (1608) occurs the phrase, "there are, 
as Hamlet says, things called whips in store ". If the reference is 
to Shakespeare's Hamlet, it may either be a misquotation of this 
passage, or it may preserve a reading not found in any of the Qq. 
Ff. But of course it may refer to the older Haj7ilet. 

76. a bare bodkin; the sense is probably ' a mere bodkin ', rather 
than ' an unsheathed bodkin '. 

80. No traveller returns. "Then how about the Ghost?", 
asked Theobald; to which Coleridge replied, "Kit be necessary 
to remove the apparent contradiction — if it be not rather a gi-eat 
beauty — surely it were easy to say that no traveller returns to this 
world as to his home or abiding place ". 

83. conscience, the exercise of conscious thought, speculation 
on the future. This speech is not merely ironical. Hamlet has 
become aware of the flaw in his own character, though he attributes 
it to humanity in general. 



156 HAMLET. [Act III. 

86. pitch. So Q 2; F i \\.2,% pit-h (of. i. 4, 22, "pith and mar- 
row"). 'Pitch' is 'height', the metaphor being from falconry. 

96. ' I may have given you love-tokens, but never my life, my 
very self.' 

103. At this moment Hamlet hears a rustle behind the arras, and 
immediately suspects Ophelia's good faith. He begins to speak 
cynically out of the disbelief in women which his mother has now 
taught him. For the antithesis between 'honest' and 'fair' cf. 
the dialogue between Touchstone and Audrey in As You Like It, act 
iii. sc. 3. 

119. inoculate. The metaphor is of course from gardening ; cf. 
Glossary, s.v. 

120. of it, of our old stock. 

122. Hamlet again becomes tender to Ophelia; he tries by self- 
accusation to persuade her that his love was little loss. He is not 
entirely insincere; he feels that those evil tendencies are really 
dormant in him, though they will very likely never come into action. 
He is ' crawling between earth and heaven ', without the strength 
to take definitely the way either of good or of evil. And, as often 
in the crises of life, he feels compelled to confess what is worst in 
him. Cf. the self-accusations of Malcolm in Macbeth, act iv. sc. 3. 

132 {130). Hamlet suddenly determines to test Ophelia by the 
question, 'Where's your father?' She lies to him, and he then 
bursts into a partly genuine, partly assumed extravagance of invec- 
tive against womankind, unfairly enough applying it all to her. 

142 [137). Get thee to a nunnery, i.e. 'breed no children'. In 
line 122 the implied reason was the wickedness of man; now it is 
the falseness of woman. 

148 {142). paintings... face. So Q2; F i hzs> prattlings . . .pace. 
Line 51 supports the Q 2 reading; cf. also Merchant of Veriice, 
iii. 2. 88, sqq. — 

"Look on beauty 
And you shall see 'tis purchased by the weight". 

151 {144). Hamlet is satirizing various forms of feminine affectation 
or unreality, the painted face, the affected speech and walk, the use 
of dubious words in pretended innocence. What particular affectation 
is meant by 'nick-name God's creatures'? Perhaps such discourse 
as that of Beatrice to Benedick in the first scene of Much Ado, a 
merely superficial raillery, covering other feelings. 

155. all but one. Claudius is the one. 

157. Ophelia sinks down in a chair, her face buried in her hands. 
Hamlet is just leaving the stage, when he turns round, gently 
approaches her, raises a lock of her hair, and presses it to his lips, 
before he finally goes. — So Mr. Beerbohm Tree plays the part, and 
Kean used some similar business. 



Scene 2.] NOTES. 157 

161. mould of form, model on which all formed themselves. 

167. blown, in full blossom. 

171. The double negative is common in Shakespeare and Eliza- 
bethan writers generally. Cf. Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 406. 

175. for to. When 'to' lost its prepositional force and became 
merely the sign of the infinitive, 'for' was added to strengthen the 
sense of motion or purpose. Cf. Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 152. 

178. tribute. Aethelred the Unready (994) began the practice of 
buying off the Danish invaders of England. Hence arose the tax 
known as Danegelt, which was levied long after the invasions had 
ceased, though it was no longer paid to the Danes. 

184. Polonius still sticks to his own theory. 

192. Eaves-dropping appears to be Polonius' one conception of 
statesmanship. 

Scene 2. 

This important scene finally convinces Hamlet of the king's guilt ; 
it closes with a resolution to 'do bitter business'. Hamlet is through- 
out in a state of extreme nervous tension ; at the success of his plot 
he breaks into the wildest excitement. Hence the nonsense he talks 
to Ophelia, and his riotous fooling of the courtiers. The episodes 
with the players and Horatio serve partly as a quiet opening to the 
turbulent emotions of the play-scene, partly to show that Hamlet's 
action is fundamentally sane and rational. It is characteristic of him 
to be able to interest himself at such a critical moment in the niceties 
of the actor's art. 

I. The effectiveness of restraint, of the middle course between 
ranting and tameness — that is the gist of Hamlet's counsel. 

10 {8). Cf. Every Woman in her Hti7no2tr (1609), "As none wear 
hoods but monks and ladies, and feathers but forehorses . . . none 
periwigs but players and pictures". 

12. the groundlings, the inferior part of the audience, who paid 
a penny for standing room in the yard or 'pit' of the theatre. Cf. 
Jonson, Bartholomew Fair, Induction, "The understanding gentle- 
men of the ground here asked my judgment". 

15. Termagant, supposed to be a god of the Saracens, a bois- 
terous character often represented in the mysteries. Cf. Guy of War- 
wick, where the Sultan says — 

"So help me Mahoun of might 

And Termagaunt my god so bright"; 

and Bale, Acts of English Votaries [Reliqices, i. 77), "Grennyng 
upon her lyke Termagauntas in a play". In i Henry IV. v. 4. 114 
the word is used as an adjective, "that hot termagant Scot". Skeat 



158 HAMLET. [Act III. 

derives it from the Ital. Trivigante, the moon who wanders (Lat. 
vagari) through the heavens in a threefold aspect (Lat. ter\ as Hecate, 
Selene, Artemis. 

16. Herod, another common character in the mysteries. It was 
traditionally played with as much noise and rant as possible. Cf. the 
stage-direction in the Coventry play of The Nativity, "Here Erode 
ragis in thys pagond, and in the strete also". In the Chester play 
of The Slaughter of the Innocents (ed. Sh. Soc. p. 153) he is made to 
say — • 

"For I am kinge of all mankinde, 
I byde, I beate, I lose, I bynde, 
I maister the moone, take this in mynde, 

That I am moste of mighte, 
I am the greatest above degree, 
That is, that was, that ever shalbe". 

Chaucer [Miller''s Tale, 3384) says of the parish clerk, Absolon, 
" He pleyeth Herodes up on a scaffold hye". 

24 {20). The saying that the stage should hold the mirror up to 
nature should be taken strictly in accordance with the context ; it is 
not a pronouncement in favour of realism on the stage, but only a 
plea for naturalness of gesture and speech in acting. 

50 {48). The following lines are inserted here in Q i. There is 
nothing corresponding to them in Q 2 or F I : — 

"And then you have some again, that keeps one suit 
Of jests, as a man is known by one suit of 
Apparell, and gentlemen quotes his jests down 
In their tables, before they come to the play, as thus : 
'Cannot you stay till I eat my porridge?' and, 'You owe me 
A quarter's wages'; and, 'My coat wants a cullison'; 
And, 'Your beer is sour'; and blabbering with his lips, 
And thus keeping in his cinque-pace of jests. 
When, God knows, the warm Clown cannot make a jest 
Unless by chance, as the blind man catches a hare ; 
Masters! tell him of it". 

It seems to have been the common practice of the clowns to insert 
'gag' in their parts, like a modern actor of Gaiety burlesque. Stowe 
praises the 'extemporal wit' of Thomas Wilson and Richard Tarlton. 
It has been suggested that the passage in Q I was aimed especially 
at the famous comic actor, William Kempe, who probably acted the 
serving-men of Shakespeare's earlier comedies. He appears to have 
left the Chamberlain's company in 1599, but in 1602 he had returned 
to them, and this may well explain the omission of the passage in 
Q 2 and F i. Cf. Introduction, page 16. 

59. Hamlet's admiration for Horatio, a man of such opposite 
character to himself, is very natural. Apparently he has confided 



Scene 2.] NOTES. i59 

in him to some extent, though probably Horatio was hardly capable 
of fully understanding or helping Hamlet in his difficulties. 

66. pregnant, because the fawning courtesy may lead to 'thrift' or 
'profit'. 

74. "According to the doctrine of the four humours, desire and 
confidence were seated in the blood, and judgment in the phlegm, 
and the due mixture of the humours made a perfect character." 
(Johnson. ) 

75. Doubtless Hamlet recurs to the idea suggested here in the 
episode of the recorders. 

81. One scene, the ' dozen or sixteen lines' of ii. 2. 565. See 
note ad loc. 

84. i.e. ' make a mental note of every action'. 

95. idle. If this really means 'mad', it is a pretty clear proof 
that the madness is assumed. Cf. Glossary, s.v. 

98. the chameleon's dish. Cf. Two Genthmen of Verotia, ii. i. 
178, "Though the chameleon Love can feed on the air"; and Sir 
T. Browne, Pseiuiodoxia Epidemica, iii. xx. " Concerning the cha- 
meleon, there generally passeth an opinion that it liveth only upon 
air, and is sustained by no other aliment". 

99. promise -crammed. Claudius has promised Hamlet that he 
shall be his 'son', when he should be king (i. 2. 64); and Hamlet 
has promised to slay Claudius, but does not do it. 

102. are not mine, do not refer to my question. 

108. Julius Caesar. There are numerous records of performances 
of plays, both in Latin and English, in the colleges of Oxford and 
Cambridge. In 1607 C(Bsar and Pompey or Casar's Revenge was 
acted at Trinity, Oxford ; this was in English. A Latin play on 
Caesar's death was acted at Christ Church in 1582. It will be re- 
membered that Shakespeare's own Julius Ca:sar appeared about 
1601, the probable date of the first version^ oi Hamlet. 

109. i' the Capitol. The murder of Csesar actually took place 
in the Theatre of Pompey, which stood in the Campus Martius. 
Here, as in Julius Ccesar and Atitony and Cleopatra, Shakespeaiie 
transfers the scene of it to the Capitol. 

132. Hamlet means that 'your only jig-maker' is what would 
have been expected to cause sorrow, the death of a husband and 
father. 

136. two months. In i. 2. 138 it was 'not two', and in i. 2. 
153 the marriage of Claudius and Gertrude was said to have taken 
place ' within a month'. This leaves about a month for the interval 
between acts i. and ii. Cf. act ii. sc. 2, note, ad fin. 

138. I '11 have a suit of sables. The obvious sense is, ' I '11 



i6o ' HAMLET. [Act III. 

give up mourning, throw off niy inky cloak'. But 'sable' certainly 
means as a rule black. Probably the meaning here is ' robes 
trimmed with the fur of sables ', which were sumptuous and ex- 
pensive, and not regarded as mourning. Others take the word as 
equivalent to the French isabelle or ' flame-colour'. 

144. Apparently this is a line from a ballad. It is again quoted 
in Lovis Labour's Lost, iii. i. 30. The 'hobby-horse' was a 
character in the may-games and morris-dances. It was represented 
by a man astride upon a stick with a horse's head upon it. It ap- 
pears to have been suppressed at the Reformation, and to this fact 
the ballad probably referred. 

145. It was common for the action of a play to be briefly repre- 
sented in dumb-show at the beginning, not, however, on the English 
stage, but on that of Denmark. Hunter quotes a description of 
such a performance given by Danish soldiers in 1688, from the diary 
of Abraham de la Pryme. It would seem, however, that in this case 
the device rather gives away Hamlet's design to surprise the king. 
The dumb-show must have prepared him for what followed. 

147. miching mallecho, 'secret mischief (cf. Glossary, s.vv.), 
in a double sense, of the poisoner's crime, and of Hamlet's own 
secret plot. There is a similar double-entendre in the use of the title 
'The Mousetrap' (line 247). 

165. Here at least, whatever may have been his purpose in act ii. 
sc. 2, Shakespeare imitates the cruder style of the earlier English 
tragic drama. Both the rhymes and the stilted language are char- 
acteristic thereof. Cf. the laboured periphrases by which lines 165 
to 168 express the fact that thirty years have passed, with Shake- 
speare's own parallel phrase in i. i. 36. 

175. distrust yoUj am distrustful for you; cf. i. 3. 51, "fear me 
not". 

177. holds quantity, are proportionate to each other. For the 
use of a singular verb with a double substantive cf. Abbott, Sh. Gr. 
§336. 

178. ' They have naught either of fear and love, or they have both 
in extremity.' 

240. Note the irony of putting this in the Queen's mouth. 

249. Vienna. Q i has Guyana. 

Gonzago. In Q i the name is given as Albertus. Moreover 
in Q I Albertus and Baptista are throughout called Duke and 
Duchess-, in Q 2, except for this line^ they are always King ?^Vidc 
Queen. The retention of the titles of Q i, even in one place only, 
betrays that a change has been made. 

253. A proverbial expression, found in Lyly, and in Damon and 
Pythias (1582), "I know the gall'd horse will soonest wince". 



Scene 2.] NOTES. 161 

255, a chorus. In Wiriter's Tale, Romeo and Juliet, Henry V., 
a chorus is introduced to explain the progress of tlie action. 

257. the puppets, the He and She, the actors in the comedy of 
love. At 'puppet shows' or 'motion', as in the modern Punch and 
Judy show, the dialogue was spoken by some one on or behind the 
stage. Cf. Two Gentlemen of Verona, ii. I. 100, "O excellent 
motion! O exceeding puppet ! Now will he interpret to her". So 
Greene, in his Groatsworth of Wit, says of himself, "It was I that 
...for seven years' space was absolute interpreter of the puppets". 
And Nash, in his Fieire Penniless, "the puling accent of her voice 
is like a feigned treble, or one's voice that interprets to the 
puppets". Hamlet wantonly insults Ophelia with cynical talk of 
love. 

262. mistake, i.e. take amiss. So Q 2, F i, with an obvious 
reference to the Marriage Service. Many editors adopt Pope's 
must take. 

265. Cf. The True Tragedie oj Richard the Third (p. 61, Sh. 
Soc. reprint) — 

" The screeking raven sits croaking for revenge, 
Whole herds of beasts comes bellowing for revenge ". 

266. This speech is doubtless Hamlet's 'dozen or sixteen hues'; 
cf. ii. 2. 565, note. 

268. midnight weeds. Cf. iv. 7. 143, and Macbeth, iv. i. 25, 
" Root of hemlock digged i' the dark". 

269. Hecate, or Diana in her aspect as an infernal goddess, was 
regarded in the Middle Ages as the queen of witches. 

274. No such Italian form of the story can be identified. 

277. This line is omitted in Q 2, probably by accident, a^- it occurs 
in Q I. As Mr. Beerbohm Tree plays the part, Hamlet's excitement 
increases during the delivery of Lucianus' — his own — speech. He 
creeps across the iloor of the hall, muttering the words from a 
written paper, and as the King rises, he leaps up wildly, tears the 
paper, and scatters the fragments in the air. 

282, In the rest of the scene, Hamlet indulges the excitement 
which he has held pent up during the play. But his elation is, at 
any rate at first, less' at knowing the truth than at the artistic success 
of his dramatic venture. The source of Hamlet's quatrain is un- 
known, if it is a quotation at all. 

go weep ; cf the passage on Jaques and the weeping deer in 
As You Like It, act ii. sc. i. 

286. this, this specimen of play writing. 

287. turn Turk, go to the bad ; the phrase recurs in Much Ado, 
iii. 4. 57. Cf. Cooke, Greene's Tu Quoqiie (1614), "This it is to 
turn Turk, from an absolute and most complete gentleman, to a 
most absurd and ridiculous lover". 

(885) ^ 



1 62 HAMLET. [Act III. 

288. Provincial roses, the double damask rose, Gerard's Rosa 
provincialis, so called either from Provence, or from Provins, a town 
forty miles from Paris. 

290. Half a share. A collection of papers of the year 1635, 
printed by Mr. Halli well-Phillipps in his Outlines of the Life of Shake- 
speare, vol. i. p. 312, throws much light on the internal economy 
of the King's Company. The profits were divided between the 
'actors' and the 'housekeepers' or proprietors, some of whom were 
actors also — witness the following extract, "That the house of the 
Globe was formerly divided into sixteen partes, whereof Mr. Cuthbert 
Burbidge and his sisters had eight, Mrs. Condell four, and Mr. 
Heminges four. That Mr. Tailor and Mr. Lowen were long since 
admitted to purchase four partes between them from the rest, viz., 
one part from Mr. Heminges, two partes from Mrs. Condell, and 
halfe a part a peece from Mr. Burbidge and his sister". 

292. The friendship of Damon and Pythias was famous in an- 
tiquity. 

294. Jove himself; cf iii. 4. 46. 

295, A very, very — pajock. The word 'pajock' is humorously 
substituted for 'ass', which would — more or less — have rhymed. 
Many explanations of it have been given, but Dyce has shown that 
in Scotland the peacock is often called a 'peajock', just as the 
turkey is a 'bubbly-jock'. Therefore we may be content, with 
Pope, to see an allusion to the fable of the birds choosing the pea- 
cock as king instead of the eagle. Mr. Irving adds a point by 
looking at a peacock-feather fan which he has taken from Ophelia's 
lap. Skeat, however, derives 'pajock' from 'patch', ' a pied fool ', 
and this explanation is supported by Spenser's use of 'patchocke' for 
ragamuffin. Claudius is called 'a king of shreds and patches' in 
iii. 4. 102. Prof Leo suggests that Hamlet leaves his sentence un- 
finished, and \};\z.t pajock is a misprint for a stage-direction Hiccups ! 

303. A recorder appears to have been a l^ute with a hole bored 
in the side, and covered with gold-beaters' skin, so as to approach the 
effect of the human voice. 

316. more richer. Cf. ii. i. 11, note. 

345. were she ten times our mother. This sounds mere folly 
to Rosencrantz, but Hamlet intends to reproach, not to be reproached. 

348. these pickers and stealers, these hands, in allusion to the 
phrase in the catechism, "Keep my hands from picking and steal- 
ing". Cf As You Like It, iv. i. iii, "By this hand, it will not 
kill a fly ". 

354. Hamlet ironically suggests a cause for his distemper which 
Rosencrantz will understand. As a matter of fact the loss of the 
crown is a small item in his score against Claudius. More is made 
of it in Q I and in Belleforest. 



Scene 3.] NOTES. ' 163 

358. Malone quotes from Whetstone, Promos and Cassandra 
(1578), "Whylst grass doth growe, oft starves the seely steede"; 
and from The Paradise of Dainty Devices (1578), " While grass doth 
growe, the silly horse he sterves ". 

360. To withdraw with you. He beckons Guildenstern aside, 
as if to impart a secret to him. 

365. Guildenstern's speech was mere words, with no intelligible 
meaning. 

372. as lying, at which Guildenstern has shown himself profi- 
cient. 

373. and thumb. So F i; Q 2 has and the umber. 
385. this little organ, himself, rather than the recorder. 

397. backed like a weasel. The full absurdity of Polonius' 
complaisance is only realized by remembering that the back of a 
camel is its most conspicuous part, and quite unlike that of a 
weasel. 

412. Nero was the murderer of his mother Agrippina. 

417. seals, the seal of deeds. 

Hamlet ends the scene on a note of the firmest resolution. 

Scene 3. 

Hamlet has his opportunity to translate resolution into action and 
misses it. Critics have objected to what they regard as the cold- 
blooded cruelty of his reasons for not killing the king while he is 
praying. But they do not observe that these are not reasons, only 
excuses. Hamlet would kill the king if he could, but he has delayed 
so long that he cannot now commit himself to the definite immediate 
act. But the hour is slipping from him. Claudius, in spite of his 
momentary weakness of contrition, is determined to be quit, in one 
way or another, of this dangerous prince. 

5. The terms of our estate, the conditions on which the safety 
of our crown depends. 

7. lunacies. So F i; Q 2 has browes. 

9. many many. Cf. i. 2. 129, " too too solid flesh " 

II. Cf. Laertes' speech, i. 3. 10, sqq. 

15. The cease... dies is a somewhat tautological expression. 
Bailey proposed to read Deceasing majesty. 

30. As a matter of fact, it was Polonius' own suggestion. Cf iii. 
I. 184. 
33. of vantage, from a point of vantage. 

35. dear my lord. ' My lord ', ' my liege ', become practically 
a single noun, like the French milord. 



i64 HAMLET. [Act III. 

37. Claudius' better self is strong enough to make him repent 
his crime, not to lead him to give up the fruits of it. The touch 
of remorse is artistically necessary to prevent his becoming a mere 
abstract character, beyond the reach of our understanding and sym- 
pathy. ' 

37. the primal eldest curse, the curse of Cain 

39. as sharp as will, sharp enough, if nothing were in the way, 
to determine the will. Theobald proposed as '' twill. 

45. Cf. Lady Macbeth's washing of her hands in Macbeth, v. i. 
31, and ii. 3. 60 — 

" Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood 
Clean from my hand?" 

62. For the omission of the auxiliary verb with compelled cf. i. 2. 
90, and Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 403. 

Claudius' confession removes the last vestige of doubt from the 
spectators' minds as to the truth of the ghost's story. 

75. Once Hamlet begins to ' scan ' and speculate he is lost. 

78. A pause, while Hamlet reflects in silence. 

80. Cf. i. 5. 76, sqq. 

full of bread. Cf. Ezekiel, xvi. 49, " Behold, this was the ini- 
quity of thy sister Sodom; pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of 
idleness was in her and her daughters". 

83. ' So far as we can tell by inference, not direct knowledge.' 

93? 94- This passage "recalls very forcibly some of those painfully 
realistic representations of the torments of the damned, which are to 
be found in various illustrated books of the sixteenth and seventeenth 
centuries" (Marshall). The damned souls in the miracle plays were 
always represented with black faces. Cf. Henry V. ii. 3. 42, "Do 
you not remember, a' saw a flea stick upon Bardolph's nose, and a' 
said it was a black soul burning in hell-fire ". Mr. Symons quotes 
R. Browning, Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister — 

" If I trip him just a dying 

Sure of heaven as sure can be. 
Spin him round, and send him flying 
Off to hell, a Manichee ". 

06. This line is terribly ironical; Hamlet's delay only prolongs the 
days of his ineffectiveness and failure. 

Scene 4. 

Much critical controversy has been spent on the question of Ger- 
trude's guilt or innocence in the matter of her husband's murder. I 
think the natural inference from this scene (especially line 30), and 



Scene 4.] NOTES. 165 

from the Ghost's story in act i. scene 5, is that slie knew nothing of 
it. She was guilty of a sinful love for Claudius, but was not an accom- 
plice in his greater crime. Hamlet, indeed, assumes throughout that 
the stain of murder as well as of adultery is upon her, but he is natu- 
ralJy inclined to take the blackest view. It is noteworthy that in the 
First Quarto the Queen's innocence is much more definitely declared 
(cf. Appendix A). 

In any case, it is his mother's faithlessness in love that is most 
bitterly in Hamlet's mind, and with this he chiefly upbraids her. At 
first he is successful ; the stings of remorse begin to make themselves 
felt. Then comes the ghost, and she is convinced that Hamlet is 
mad. From that moment she is overcome with fear, a)id his words 
pass over her unheeded. For the rest of the play her heart is cleft 
in twain ; she vacillates to the end between good and evil, between 
her son and her lover. 

4. silence. So Q 2, F i. Many editors accept Hanmer's emenda- 
tion sconce. 

g, 10. thy father... my father, Claudius... the elder Hamlet. 

24. Hamlet evidently thinks that the king is concealed behind the 
arras. He aims a blow at him out of pure impulse, M'ithout waiting 
to consider. And thus in the death of Polonius comes the first 
tragic result of his delay. 

33. Hamlet is too intent on the business in hand to give Polonius 
more than a brief epitaph. 

42. the rose, the charm, the grace; cf. iii. I. 160. The idea is 
that Gertrude's wicked love makes the purest love seem a shameful 
thing. 

44. sets a blister there. Harlots were branded in the forehead ; 
cf. iv. 5. 119, and Cotnedy of Errojs, ii. 2. 138, "tear the stained 
skin off my harlot-brow". 

49. this solidity and compound mass, the earth itself. For 
the idea of the whole universe being affected by a sin, cf Milton, 
Paradise Lost., ix. 1000 — 

" Earth trembled from her entrails, as again 
In pangs, and nature gave a second groan ; 
Sky loured, and, muttering thunder, some sad drops 
Wept at completing of the mortal sin - 
Original". 

53. Opinions differ as to the action that should accompany this 
line on the stage. I have very little doubt that Hamlet draws a 
miniature, a 'picture in little' (ii. 2. 384), of his father from his 
pocket, and then turns to point at one of Claudius that hangs on the 
wall of the closet. Both Irving and Salvini suppose the pictures to 
be seen with the mind's eye only. 



i66 HAMLET. [Act III. 

95. Ct. iii, 2. 414. 

98. a vice of kings. The Vice was a stock character in the 
Moralities ; he appears to have personified the weaker side of human 
nature (hence his name) ; but practically he was a buffoon, and sup- 
plied the comic element in the dramas. Thus he is one of the ances- 
tors of Shakespeare's fools. Several allusions to the Vice and his 
dagger of lath appear in the plays; cf. e.g. Twelfth Night, iv. 2. 
132— 

" I '11 be with you again 
In a trice 

Like to the old Vice, 
Your need to sustain ; 

Who, with dagger of lath, 
In his rage and his wrath. 
Cries, ah, ha! to the deVil". 

Thus "a vice of kings" means practically 'a Yxwgpour rire\ 

102. shreds and patches. The Vice, like his successor the Fool, 
appears to have been often dressed in motley. Cf. Mr. Skeat's inter- 
pretation of 'pajock' in iii. 2. 295, note. 

103. At his previous apparition the Ghost was visible to all those 
present, now he only allows himself to be seen by Hamlet, just as 
the ghost in Macbeth appears to the king only. 

106. Here, as in ii. 2. 593, sqq., Hamlet is quite conscious of his 
own weakness. 

107. lapsed in time and passion, having allowed both time 
and the passion of revenge to slip by. 

122. start up and stand. ' Hair', partly perhaps owing to the 
influence of 'soldiers', is treated as a plural. 

126. A reminiscence of the biblical phrase, "I say unto you, If 
these should hold their peace, the very stones should cry out". 

133. Cf. iii. I. 171, note. 

139 &c. Those who believe that Hamlet was really mad get over 
this speech by pointing out that nearly all insane patients are prepared 
to solemnly assert their own sanity. 

150. avoid what is to come, not 'avoid the future', but ' avoid 
sin in the future'. 

151. 'Do not, by any new indulgence, heighten your former 
offences.' 

152. Even in his tenderness Hamlet cannot quite forget the bitter- 
ness of cynicism. 

157. the worser; cf. in. 2. 316, note. 

160. Assume, not 'pretend', but 'acquire'. 



Scene 4.] NOTES. 167 

Lines 161-165 are not in F i. 

161. all sense, all consciousness ot sinning. 

162. Of habits devil, the evil genius of our habits. Q 2 has no 
comma after 'eat', and Theobald proposed to read — 

PVAo all sense doth eat 
Of habits evil. 

Lines 168-170 ( down to the vfoxA pote7icy) are not in F i. 

169. And either... the devil. Q 2 h^% And either the drt/il, an 
obvious misprint. Some such emendation as lay, curb, quell, shame, 
or perhaps house, throne, is necessary. 

172. same is used sarcastically, as so often in Shakespeare. 

182. The rest of this speech is meant ironically. 

bloat. So Theobald for the bloivt of Q 2, bbint of F i. 

183. mouse, a term of endearment. Cf Love s Labour'' s Lost, 
V. 2. 19, and Twelfth Night, i. 5. 69, " Good my mouse of virtue, 
answer me ". 

194. The only other possible allusion to this lost story is in a 
letter of Sir John Suckling, " It is the story of the jackanapes and 
the partridges ; thou starest after a beauty till it be lost to thee, and 
then let'st out another, and starest after that till it is gone too." 

195. To try conclusions, to see what will happen. 

200. I must to England. How does Hamlet know this? 
The scheme was imparted to Polonius in iii. i. 177, to Rosencrantz 
and Guildenstern in iii. 3. 4. Hamlet has had no chance of learn- 
ing it from them ; and if he knew of it, he must have seen the 
danger of leaving the king alive. Moreover in iv. 3. 48 he expresses 
surprise at the news of his intended voyage. 

210, Hamlet puns on the two senses of 'craft', viz. 'ship' and 
' guile '. 

211. packing, plotting; perhaps also with reference to the other 
sense of ' being off'. 

213. Hamlet has always a keen scent for the ironies of life. 

I am inclined to accept Mr. Rose's suggestion that the first three 
scenes of the traditional act iv. should really be regarded as part of 
act iii. Then if with him we give act iii. sc. i to act ii., the 
events of act iii. will be those of 'one tremendous night'. Act iv. 
w^ill cover Hamlet's absence, and act v., as now, begin with his 
return. By this arrangement we get well set on foot in act iii. two 
chains of effects springing from Hamlet's critical failure in act iii. 
sc. 3. These are the attempt of Claudius upon his life, and the 
death of Polonius, with its results. For the working out of these 
chains see note to act iv. sc. 4, inii. 



i68 HAMLET. [Act IV. 

Act IV.— Scene I. 

This scene is practically continuous with act iii, sc. 4. As soon 
as Hamlet has left his mother's closet, Claudius enters, to know the 
result of the interview. He finds the Queen overwhelmed and 
hardly able to speak — the combined effect of her son's reproaches 
and of her grief at his ecstasy. 

12. good old man, for so, in spite of his tediousness (ii. 2. 95), 
Polonius appeared to those gifted with less keen perceptions than 
Hamlet's. Even Claudius had faith in him (ii. 2. 154). 

27. he weeps. There does not seem to be anything in the 
last scene to justify this statement. Some critics think that Ger- 
trude is henceforward on Hamlet's side, and is here doing her best 
to put his conduct in a favourable light. I doubt this; when in 
the presence of Claudius, she se ;ms to be under his influence still. 

40. This line is apparently incomplete in Q 2. F i omits lines 
41-5, and ends the scene with^ — 

And what ''s untimely done. Oh come away. 
My soul is full of discord and dismay. 

The most likely emendation of the Q 2 text is Capell's so, haply, 
slander. Tschischwitz suggests by this, suspicion. 

Scene 2. 

In this scene and the following, Hamlet continues his assumption 
of madness. He is not at all unwilling to be sent to England ; it 
will oblige him to a further delay ; and he promises himself an in- 
tellectual treat in checkmating any design which his companions 
may have against him. 

12, a sponge; cf Barnabe Rich, Faults, Faults, and Nothing else 
but Fatclts (1606), "Vespasian, when reproached for bestowing 
high office upon persons most rapacious, answered ' that he served 
his turn with such officers as with spunges, which, when they had 
drunk their fill, were then the fittest to be pressed ". Both Shake- 
speare and Rich are indebted for the idea to Suetonius, Vita Vesp. 
c. 16. In Q I this passage occurs near the end of act iii. sc. 2. 

ig. like an ape. So F i ; but the Q 2 reading, like an apple, is 
nearly as good. Q I has as an Ape doth mits. 

29. Here, as in ii. 2. 269, Hamlet is probably talking deliberate 
nonsense. But the interpretations of various grave editors may be 
found in Fujness' Variortim edition. 

32. Cf. Psalm cxliv. " Man is like a thing of naught", and the 
contemptuous use of the phrase in Midsu7nmer Nighfs Dream, iv. 2. 
13, "a paramour is, God bless us, a thing of naught". 



Scene 4.] NOTES. 169 

Hide fox, and all after. This phrase is omitted in Q 2 : it 
is said to be a name for ' hide and seek '. Perhaps Hamlet rushes 
from the room, leaving the rest to pursue him ; or perhaps the fox 
is Polonius, who, if he does not now, will soon stink like one. Cf 
iv. 3- 37- 

Scene 3. 

9. Cf Lyly, Euphues (p. 67. ed. Arber), "A desperate disease is to 
be committed to a desperate doctor ". 

21-23. worms... emperor... diet. There is an allusion to the 
famous Diet or convocation of the dignities of the German Empire 
held at Worms in 1521. It was before this that Luther was sum- 
moned to appear. 

The thought here is very similar to that of v. i. 218, sqq. 

33. a progress, the technical term for a royal journey of state 
through the provinces. 

48. Cf. iii. 4. 200, note. 

50. ' Whatever your purposes are, the angels are fighting on my 
side.' 

63. free awe, awe which does not need compulsion. 

66. congruing. So Q 2 ; F i has conjuring. 

70. were ne'er begun. So F i ; Q 2 has will ne^er begin. 

Scene 4. 

The present Act works out the results of Hamlet's failure until 
they bring about the catastrophe of act v. There are two main 
threads of incident. Firstly, there is the failure of the plot against 
Hamlet's life, which leads to his return to England, and drives 
Claudius to new devices; and secondly, Hamlet's unkindness to 
Ophelia, together with the death of Polonius, sends her mad. 
Laertes returns, burning for revenge, and readily becomes the king's 
accomplice. 

The stress laid upon the fortunes of Ophelia in the latter part of 
the play has its dramatic purpose. It impresses us with the fact that 
Hamlet's ineffectiveness has its tragic results outside his own life; 
and at the same time the pathos of the situation makes us feel pity 
rather than anger towards him, since his deep affection for Ophelia 
is manifest throughout. And it is essential to the effect of tragedy 
that the sympathies of the spectator should be at the end with the 
hero. 

The scene with the captain serves as a transition to the new Act ; 
and at the same time strikes the note of contrast between Hamlet 
and Fortinbras, the strong practical man. The perception of this 
contrast is characteristically put in Hamlet's own mouth. 



lyo HAMLET. [Act IV. 

Attempts have been made, without much success, to find an allusion 
in the expedition of Fortinbras to some enterprise of Raleigh or Essex 
or some other Elizabethan worthy. 

3. Craves. So Q2; F i has clai7?is. 

6. in his eye. Cf. iv. 7. 46, and Aiito7iy and Cleopatra^ ii. 2. 
212 — 

" Her gentlewomen, like the Nereides, 
So many mermaids, tended her i' the eyes ". 

The phrase occurs as a technical one for ' in the royal presence ' in 
the household books of James the First's reign. In F i the scene 
ends with line 8. 

36. Cf. i. 2. 150. 

40, 41, some craven scruple... on the event. Hamlet describes 
his own weakness better than anyone can do it for him. 

50. Makes mouths at, mocks at. 

53. Is it by irony that Hamlet repeats Polonius' counsel? Cf. i. 
3- 65. 

6o. twenty thousand. It was only 'two thousand' in line 25, 

66. my thoughts, always thoughts, never deeds. 

A comparison of ii. 2. 58, sqq., with line 2 of this scene points to 
an interval of a few days between scenes 3 and 4, in order that 
Claudius' ' license ' may reach Fortinbras. These must be spent by 
Hamlet in travelling from Elsinore — though it is on the sea (i. 4. 71) 
— to the port. Yet both i. 3. I and iv. 3. 43 imply that the port is 
close at hand. But iv. 3. 54 shows that Flamlet started directly 
after scene 3. 

In any case, a longer interval follows this scene, during which 
Laertes returns from France. 

Scene 5. 

The interest of scenes 5 and 7 lies partly in the ingenuity with 
which the king turns Laertes to his purposes, partly in the pathos 
of Ophelia's madness and death. Laertes is a youth of high spirit 
and true emotions, but his French training has left him without high 
principle, and he is weak enough to be easily led. The genuine 
insanity of Ophelia is a pendant to that assumed by Hamlet; the 
immediate cause is her father's death, yet the loss of her lover must 
also have affected her deeply. The character of the songs she sings 
— they are not given in full in this edition — is not inconsistent with 
perfect purity; all who have had experience of mad patients can 
confirm this ; and therefore it gives no support to the curious theory, 
held by no less a critic than Goethe, that she had been Hamlet's 
mistress. 



Scene 5.] NOTES. 171 

2. Gent. So Q 2 ; these speeches are given in F I to Horatio, 
and lines 14, 15 to the Queen. 

g. to collection, to collect some meaning from it. 

II. which; the antecedent appears to be ' the words'. 

17. Gertrude is still weakly remorseful. 

23. The music used for Ophelia's songs upon the stage is said to 
have been handed down by tradition from Shakespeare's time. It is 
printed in Furness' Variorum edition, and in Chappell's Popular 
Music of the Olden Tijne, vol. i. 

D. G. Rossetti used this first stanza as the opening of a beautiful 
little poem called Ait Old Song Ended. 

26. The cockle hat, staff, and sandals were the guise of a pilgrim, 
often the disguise of a lover. Notice the confusion in Ophelia's 
mind throughout between her father and her sweetheart. She hardly 
knows which is dead. Of course she never had any conception of 
how Polonius came by his death. That was kept a profound secret 
in the court, and Claudius himself was suspected in consequence. 

38. did go. Both Q 2 and F i read did not go., surely in error. 

41. There is a monkish legend that a baker's daughter was turned 
into an owl for refusing bread to our Saviour. It is said by Douce 
to be well known in Gloucestershire, and Mr. Leland ( The English 
Gipsies) found it among the gipsies, among whom the name for an 
owl is Maromengro's Chavi, or Baker's Daughter. The connection 
in Ophelia's mind is simply the idea of a sudden transformation, or 
change of circumstances, such as her father's death and Hamlet's 
absence have brought about for her. 

48. It was the custom for the first girl seen by a man on the 
morning of Feb. 14th to be regarded as his valentine, or true-love, 
for the year. 

89. in clouds, in mysterious reserve; the emendation inclosed is 
quite superfluous. 

95. a murdering-piece. This is generally explained as a piece 
of artillery, the French meui'triere. But may it not mean a play 
representing murder? for Claudius' present situation affects him, as 
such a play would do, through the imagination. And what more 
likely than that he explained, to Gertrude, his perturbation of act iii. 
sc. 2 as due solely to the power of imagination ? 

97. Switzers. The kings of France had long a Swiss body- 
guard ; so that the term ' Switzers ' became really equivalent to 
' guards '. 

105. This may mean that the rabble supports every word that 
Laertes utters ; but I think it refers rather to ' custom ' and ' anti- 
quity ' ; unless the word ' king ' is used as these direct, it is meaning- 
less. 



172 HAMLET. [Act IV. 

iig. Cf. iii. 4. 44, note. 

brows. Both Q 2 and F i read brow. 

123. Such sentiments are common in Shakespeare (cf. e.g. Richard 
II. passim), but they are generally put in the mouths of kings them- 
selves, or their supporters. 

130. Laertes' vigour of revenge is no doubt an intentional contrast 
to the languor of the quite equally sincere Hamlet. 

142, swoopstake. Both Q 2 and F i have soopstake ; Q i has 
swoopstake-like. In a swoopstake or sweepstake the winner draws 
all the stakes from the board ; so the king suggests that Laertes 
means to make a general clearance of friend and foe. The ' winner 
and loser ' of line 143 is, of course, not the same metaphor, only 
suggested by it. 

146. the kind life -rendering pelican. F i reads ludicrously 
politician. It was a common belief that the pelican either fed its 
young or restored them to life when dead, with its own blood. Many 
attempts have been made to explain the origin of this story, but it 
appears to be a pure legend. Moreover, it originally belonged to 
the vulture— the pelican of heraldry is really a kind of vulture — and 
was only transferred to the pelican by a mistake of the compilers of 
the Vulgate. (See the Academy, xxv. 97, 243.) In the Middle Ages 
the pelican symbolized first the Resurrection, then the Eucharist. 
A curious change took place at the Reformation. Both the Catholic 
conceptions of the Eucharist and the use of symbolism in religion 
fell into disfavour, and the pelican became thenceforward an emblem 
of self-sacrifice generally, and, in especial, of true kingship. The 
emblem-books of the period illustrate this abundantly. So does 
Lyly, of whose curious Eupliuism the display of fantastic similes 
from unreal natural history is characteristic. He calls Elizabeth 
" that good Pelican that to feede hir people spareth not to rend hir 
owne personne ". From Lyly the tradition passed to Shakespeare. 
For Shakespeare, the young of the pelican represent filial ingrati- 
tude. Goneril and Regan are called ' ' those pelican daughters " 
{Lear., iii. 4. 77); and John of Gaunt, in his rebuke to Richard II. 
{Richard II. ii. I. 126), says — 

"That blood already, like the pelican, 
Hast thou tapped out and drunkenly caroused ". 

In Edwao'd III. iii. 5. 1 11, which may or may not be by Shakespeare, 
Edward asks the meaning of the device on some colours, and the 
Black Prince replies — 

"A pelican, my lord. 
Wounding her bosom with her crooked beak, 
That so her nest of young ones may be fed 
With drops of blood that issue from her heart. 
The motto ' Sic et vos '. And so should you ". 



Scene 5.] NOTES. 173 

153. Let her come in. In Q 2 this is given to Laertes; F i has 
it as part of a stage-direction. A noise within. Let her come in, 

157. rose of May. Cf. iii. i. 160; iii. 4. 42. 

160. Neither here nor in act i. sc. 3 is Laertes, in spite of his 
affection for Ophelia, quite able to understand her. 

161-163. These lines are not in Q 2. Nature, at its finest in 
Ophelia's love, has sent her wits after Polonius. 

165. Hey non nonny. Such meaningless refrains are common 
in old songs; cf. the ' adown adoM^n' of line 170, and the 'down, 
adown, adowna ' of Merry Wives, i. 4. 44. ' Hey, nonny, nonny ' 
occurs in Balthazars song "Sigh no more ladies. Sigh no more'"' 
{Mtich Ado, ii. 3. 64), and " With a hey, and a ho, and a hey 
nonino" in "It was a lover and his lass" {As Yoti Like Lt, v. 3. 17). 

172. how the wheel becomes it. These are old-fashioned 
ballads, which Ophelia has heard to the music of her nurse's spin- 
ning-wheel. Steevens' statement that ' wheel ' means a refrain is 
probably purely imaginative. 

The story or ballad of ' the false steward ' and ' his master's 
daughter ' is unknown. 

174. more, more touching. 

175. Ophelia distributes her flowers appropriately, the rosemary 
and pansies to Laertes, the fennel and columbine to Claudius, the 
rue and daisy to the queen. 

rosemary, often strewn on biers, to signify remembrance; cf. 

Romeo and Juliet, iv. 5. 79 — 

" Dry up your tears, and stick your rosemary 
On this fair corse"; 

also Winter'' s Tale, iv. 4. 74 — 

' ' For you there 's rosemary and rue ; these keep 
Seeming and savour all the winter long ; 
Grace and remembrance be to you both ". 

176. pansies are for thoughts, because of their name, the French 
pensees. The flower is also a country emblem of love and courtship. 

178. Laertes uses thoughts in a sense it sometimes has, of 
' melancholy '. 

180. fennel symbolizes flattery and columbine ingratitude; cf. 
Chapman, All Fools, ii. i — 

" What's that? a columbine? 
No ; that thankless flower fits not my garden ". 

181. rue, a bitter plant with medicinal virtues. It was symboli- 
cal of repentance, and was therefore usually mingled with the holy 



174 HAMLET. [Act IV. 

water, and known as 'herb of grace', or ' herbygrass '. This name 
was also sometimes given to wormwood, another symbol of remorse 
(cf. iii. 2. 19). When Ophelia says to the queen, ' You must wear 
your rue with a difference', she probably means, ' For you it signi- 
fies repentance, for me only regret'. Cf. Richa7'd II. iii. 4. 104 — 

' ' Here did she fall a tear ; here in this place 
I '11 set a bank of rue, sour herb of grace ; 
Rue, even for ruth, shall shortly here be seen. 
In the remembrance of a weeping queen ". 

183. a difference is properly an heraldic bearing, meant to dis- 
tinguish the arms of one branch of the same family from another. 

184. a daisy, for faithlessness, as violets are for faithfulness; cf. 
Greene, Quips for an Upstart Courtier, ' ' Next them grew the dis- 
sembling daisy to warn such light-of-love wenches not to trust every 
fair promise that such amorous bachelors make them". 

they withered all. Faithfulness, says Ophelia, left the world 
with my father. Yet here, too, Hamlet must be in her thoughts ; cf. 
i. 3. 7, where Laertes compared his love for her to ' A violet in the 
youth of primy nature'. 

187. bonny sweet Robin. Cf Two Noble Kinsmen, \v. i. lo"] — 

' ' I can sing the Broome 
And Bonny Robin". 

The tune is found in several Elizabethan song-books ; the words are 
pst, but they appear to have been a ballad on Robin Hood. 

I go. This is a song known in the song-books as The Mer?y Milk- 
maids, or The Milkmaids^ Du?nps. 

195. This scene is ridiculed in Jonson, Chapman, and Marston's 
Eastward Hoe (1604), iii. i — , 

" His head as white as milk, 
All flaxen was his hair ; 
But now he is dead. 
And laid in his bed, 
And never will come again". 

Hamlet is introduced in the same scene as a half-mad footman. 

213. burial. So F i ; Q 2 hSiS funeral. 

216. Cf. Genesis, iv. 10, "The voice of thy brother's blood 
crieth unto me from the ground " ; and Richard II. i. i. 104 — 

"Which blood, like sacrificing Abel's, cries 
Even from the tongueless caverns of the earth. 
To me for justice and rough chastisement ". 



Scene 7.] NOTES. i75 

Scene 6. 

This scene serves to keep the fortunes of Hamlet in our mind dur- 
ing the period of his absence. It is simultaneous with scenes 5 and 
7, the action of which is practically continuous, and in a modern play 
it would probably be made to take place in a corner of the same hall, 
while the King and Laertes whisper apart. 

2. Sea-faring men. So Q 2; F i has sailors. 

21. thieves of mercy, merciful thieves; cf "brow of woe", for 
' woeful brow ', in i. 2. 4. 

they knew what they did. A theory has been founded on this 
phrase, coupled with Hamlet's mysterious allusion to two crafts 
meeting in one line, and his expressed intention to delve one yard 
below his enemies' mines (iii. 4. 210), that the pirate was of his own 
procuring. But surely Hamlet's mine was merely the altering of the 
letters. (See v. 2. 12, sqq.) 

26. the bore of the matter. The metaphor is from a gun that 
will carry heavy shot. 

Scene 7. 

The Laertes motive and the Ophelia motive of scene 5 are con- 
tinued here. Laertes proves an easy tool for the king's ingenious 
villany. His naturally impetuous temper, made degenerate by 
such a life in France as is suggested in act iii. sc. I, snatches at 
even an ignoble chance of revenge. It is noteworthy that in Q i 
the proposal to use a poisoned foil comes from Claudius. 

15. his sphere. The Ptolemaic astronomy regarded the universe 
as composed of ten orbs or hollow spheres, one within the other. 
In the inmost seven of these the planets had their courses ; in the 
eighth the fixed stars ; the other two were the Crystalline and the 
Primum Mobile. There are many allusions to this arrangement in 
Shakespeare; e.g. Midsujnmer Nighfs Dream, ii. i. 153 — 

" And certain stars shot madly from their spheres 
To hear the sea-maid's music ". 

18. Cf. iv. 3. 4. 

20. that turneth wood to stone. Springs whose water is 
highly charged with lime will petrify with a deposit of it any object 
put into them. Harrison, Description of England (ed. New Sh. 
Soc. pp. 334, 349), mentions several such, one at King's Newnham 
in Warwickshire. There is a famous one also at Knaresborough. 
The Clarendon Press editors quote Lyly, Euphues (ed. Arber, p. 
63), "Would I had sipped of that river in Caria, which turneth 
those that drink of it to stone ". 

21. Convert his gyves to graces. I suppose the idea in 
'gyves' is 'faults which shpuld be fetters on his popularity'. 



176 HAMLET. [Act IV. 

Clarke interprets, "turn all my attempts to restrain him into so 
many injuries perpetrated against his innocence and good qualities". 
Theobald proposed gybes, Daniel gyres. 

22, so loud a wind. So F i ; Q 2 has so loved Arm'd. 

28. of all the age, qualifies 'challenger', not 'mount'. Mo- 
berly points out that the King of Hungary, at his coronation, stands 
on the Mount of Defiance at Presburg and challenges the world to 
dispute his claim, 

30. sleeps. The plural form occurs in Phaer's Aeneid, ii. "in 
Sleepes and drinking drownd ". 

33. Claudius hopes to hear from England of the success of his plot 
against Hamlet's life. He is ironically made to express this hope 
just before Hamlet's letter is brought in. 

34, I loved... we love, Claudius' affection for Polonius was 
personal, not merely official, 

37. this to the queen. Nothing more is said of this letter, but 
Q I has a scene where Horatio tells the Queen of Hamlet's danger, 
and she acknowledges that her husband is a villain, 

59. ' How can Hamlet be returning, and yet — it is his own 
character — how otherwise?' But several critics would read How 
should it not be so ? 

63, checking at. The metaphor is from falconry; the hawk is 
said to check when she leaves her proper game for some other bird. 

68. shall uncharge, i.e. shall not charge or accuse, 

69-82, These lines, from " My lord" to "graveness", are not in 
Fi. 

73. Hamlet is by no means a bookworm ; which accounts for his 
popularity with the common people, and for Ophelia's description of 
him in iii, I. 159, sqq. 

82. Importing health and graveness. Warburton proposed 
wealth, and Malone explained 'health' as meaning 'attention to 
health'; but probably it refers back to 'careless livery'; cf a 
similar construction in iii. i. 159, "the courtier's, soldier's, scholar's, 
eye, tongue, sword ", 

84, One remembers the feats of chivalry at Elizabeth's court, in 
which Sidney contended with ' that sv/eet enemy, France ', 

86, The mythical Centaur was doubtless in Shakespeare's mind, 

93. Lamond. So F i ; Q 2 has La7nord. Mr. Elliot Browne 
suggests an allusion to a famous swordsman, Pietro Monte, who was 
instructor to Louis the Seventh's Master of Horse, In the English 
translation of Castiglione's // Cortegiam, bk. i., he is called Peter 
Mount. 

112-119. 'Love is a thing of time, not of eternity; it has a 
beginning and an end,' 



Scene 7.] NOTES. 



177 



123. The recognition of a 'should' when it is too late is like a 
spendthrift's sigh for his squandered estate, a bitter-sweet sensation. 
It was a belief that sighing drew blood from the heart ; of. Romeo 
andjidiet, iii. 5. 59, "Dry sorrow drinks our blood". 

139. a pass of practice, either 'a treacherous pass' (cf. line 
68), or, 'a pass in which you are practised', or, 'a pass by way of 
friendly exercise ', 

146. Under the moon; cf. iii. 2. 268, note. 
151. shape, design. 

163. The scenic apparatus of Shakespeare's time would have 
been inadequate to represent Ophelia's death upon the stage; even 
now it would be difficult. Even in Ibsen's Rosmershohn, which ends 
with a suicide by drowning, the event is only reported by a witness 
who sees it from a window, 

164. Cf. Locrine, v. 5 — ■ 

" One mischief follows on another's neck. 

Who would have thought so young a maid as she 
With such a courage would have sought her death ". 

165. his hoar leaves. The willow leaf with its silvery underside 
is always a conspicuous object in river scenery; cf. Lowell, Among 
My Books, "Shakespeare understood perfectly the charm of indirect- 
ness, of making his readers seem to discover for themselves what he 
means to show them. If he wishes to tell that the leaves of the 
willow are gray on the underside, he does not make it a mere fact of 
observation by bluntly saying so, but makes it picturesquely reveal 
itself to us as it might in nature ". 

170. crow- flov^ers, generally the buttercups, sometimes the 
Lychnis Flos cuaili, or Ragged Robin. 

long purples, the country name for various species of Orchis, 
the Orchis mascula or Orchis maculata. 

178. tunes. So F i and Q i; Q 2 has iatids, i.e. chants, so 
called from the psalm Laudate Do77iinu7n. The F I reading suits 
better the character of Ophelia's songs in scene 5. 



Lady, 



This scene is ridiculed in Beaumont and Fletcher's The Scornful 
V, ii. 3— 



" I will run mad first, and if that get not pity, 
I '11 drown myself to a most dismal ditty ". 



189. these, the tears, for which he is apologizing. 

192. douts. So Knight for the dotibts of F i ; Q 2 has drowns. 

An interval of a very few days separates the Acts ; leaving time 
for Hamlet to return from the seaport (cf. iv. 4, note, ad fin.), and 
for preparation to be made for Ophelia's burial. 

(885) M 



178 HAMLET. [Act V. 



Act v.— Scene I, 

This scene does not advance the action much, for Hamlet's quarrel 
with Laertes has very little to do with their subsequent encounter ; 
it only serves to bring into contrast the opposing characters of the 
two men. But we want a moment or two of relief before the breath- 
less rush with which the play closes, and this the grim humour of 
the grave-diggers and Hamlet's moralizing afford. The solemnity 
of Ophelia's burial helps us to realize the pathos of her fate, and 
therein the tragedy of Hamlet's failure. 

The dialogue between the clowns affords an example of Shake- 
speare's unrivalled power of insight into the mental habits and modes 
of reasoning of uneducated people. 

g. se offendendo, a mistake of the clown's for se defertdeiido, a 
phrase used not in suicide cases, but in verdicts of justifiable homi- 
cide. It has been suggested that the reasoning in this speech and 
the next is a parody of the arguments used in the inquest on a certain 
Sir James Hales, reported in Plowden's Commentaries (3 Eliz. ). 

14. goodman delver. The First Clown, who takes the lead, is 
the sexton ; the Second an ordinary labourer. 

32. even Christian, fellow Christian. But there is, of course, 
an allusion to the supposed equality of all Christians in the sight of 
the Church. 

35. Adam's profession. Cf. Tennyson's Lady Clara Vere de 
Vere, "the grand old gardener and his wife", and the well-known 
couplet — 

"When Adam delved and Eve span, 
Who was then the gentleman?" 

38. This must be satire on the ludicrous statements of writers on 
heraldry, as to the antiquity of their science. The Q 2 text here 
runs : 'A was the first that ever bore arms. I HI put another question 
to thee. The printer's eye seems to have slipped from one arms to 
another. 

44. confess thyself^ It is a proverb ' Confess thyselt, and be 
hanged '. Hence the idea of a gallows-maker in the Second Clown's 
mind. 

45. Go to. The phrase here expresses the Second Clown's vague 
sense that he is being chaffed. It corresponds to the ' Garn, who 
are you a gitting at?' of the modern Londoner, 

59. and unyoke, and then thy task is done. 

68. get thee to Yaughan. So F i ; Q 2 has get thee in. 
Collier proposed Get thee to — ( Yawns) ! Yaughan is a Welsh name, 
and there is therefore no need to regard it as a corruption of the 
German Johan. Probably the allusion is to some well-known tavern- 



Scene i.] NOTES. 179 

keeper. That there was a tavern attached to the Globe theatre is 
proved by the sonnet on the burning of that playhouse (Collier, 
Annals of the Stage, i. 388). The passage looks like one of the bits 
of clown's gag satirized in iii. 2. 42 (see quotation from Q i in note 
ad loc). 

69. The Clown's song is an inaccurate version of three stanzas of 
The aged lover renoicnceth love, from TottePs Miscellany (1557). It 
is attributed in Gascoigne's Epistle to a Voting Gentleman, prefatory 
to his poems, and in Harl. MS. 1703, to Lord Vaux. In Totters 
Miscellany (ed. Arber, p. 173) the verses run as follows — 

' I lothe that I did loue, 
In youth that I thought swete : 
As time requires for my behove 
Me thinkes they are not mete. 

For age with steyling steppes. 
Hath clawed me with his crowche, 
And lusty life away she leapes, 
As there had bene none such. 

A pikeax and a spade 
And eke a shrowdyng shete 
A house of clay for to be made, 
For such a gest most mete." 

75. ' Custom hath made it proper or natural to him to take his 
employment easily.' 

90. Cf. Tinion of Athens, i. 2. 216 — 

" And now I remember, my lord, you gave 
Good words the other day of a bay courser 
I rode on ; it is yours, because you liked it ". 

100. loggats, a game resembling bowls, but played on a floor 
instead of a green. The loggats are pear-shaped pieces of wood, 
and are pitched, not rolled. 

103. for and, a strong form of ' and ', equivalent to the earlier 
' and eke '. 

106 &c. The exact interpretation of these law-terms is not of much 
importance to the interpretation of the play, but, according to Lord 
Campbell, they are "all used seemingly with a full knowledge of 
their import ". 

115 {113). the fine of his fines. The first 'fine' has the sense 
of end. This line is omitted in Q 2. The printer's eye has appar- 
ently slipped from the first his recoveries to the second; cf line 38, 
note. 



i8o HAMLET. [Act V. 

126. in that, i.e. in legal parchments, which give no assurance 
against death. 

149. by the card, with precision ; the origin of the expression 
being probably from the accuracy with which charts are drawn out. 
Staunton, however, refers it to the ' card ' of etiquette, or book of 
good manners; cf. v. 2. 114. Yet a third explanation is that it 
refers to the card or ' plat ' on which an actor's ' part ' was copied 
out for him. Some of these Elizabethan ' plats ' are still preserved. 
Cf. Appendix A. 

170. Cf. Marston, Malcontent, iii. i, "your lordship shall ever 
finde... amongst a hundred Englishmen fourscore and ten madmen". 

177. thirty years. This statement, coupled with that in line 160 
that the Sexton ' came to 't ' on the day of Hamlet's birth, is on the 
face of it conclusive that Hamlet is a man of thirty. This is con- 
sistent with the thirty years of married life of the Player King and 
Queen (iii. 2. 165), and also, as it seems to me, with Hamlet's de- 
veloped character and philosophy. Several critics, however, point 
to considerations which lead them to regard him as nearer twenty 
than thirty ; Professor Minto would treat him as a youth of seven- 
teen. The chief of these considerations are : 

(i) Hamlet's mother is still young enough to love and be loved. 
But so was the Player Queen ; and iii. 3. 68, 83 imply that Gertrude 
is a middle-aged matron. 

(ii) Hamlet is called 'young Hamlet' (i. 3. 123), and his love for 
Ophelia spoken of as "a violet in the youth of primy nature", &c, 
(i. 3. 7, sqq.). But Henry V., who is made by Shakespeare at least 
twenty-six when he comes to the throne, is spoken of as " in the 
very May-morn of his youth ". Cf. also the phrase in Much Ado, 
iii. 3. 140, " How giddily 'a turns about all the hot bloods between 
fourteen and five and thirty". 

(iii) Hamlet has barely left Wittenberg, and the Elizabethan noble 
rarely stayed at the University beyond seventeen. Certainly, in 
England, but not in Denmark. Cf. Nash, Pierce Penniless' Stippli- 
cation to the Devil (Sh. Soc. p. 27), " For fashion sake some [Danes] 
will put their children to school, but they set them not to it till they 
are fourteen years old, so that you shall see a great boy with a beard 
learn his ABC, and sit weeping under the rod when he is thirty 
years old ". 

The fact is that many men among the northern nations are no 
older at thirty than Hamlet is represented. Mr. Furnivall thinks 
that Shakespeare meant Hamlet to be about twenty when he began 
the play, but found it necessary to make him older as he went on ! 
Mr. Marshall suggests that this bit, and the " fat and scant of breath " 
bit (v. 2. 298), were put in to make the part fit the personality of 
Burbage. 

igo. three and twenty years. This date, together with Ham- 
let's boyish reminiscences of Yorick, is quite consistent with the 



Scene i.] NOTES. i8i 

'thirty years' of line 177. Q i, however, has, in place of both the 
other two passages — 

" Look you, here's a skull hath been here this dozen years. 
Let me see, ay, ever since our last King Hamlet 
Slew Fortinbras in combat, young Hamlet's father, 
He that 's mad ". 

198. Yorick. Dr. Nicholson finds in this passage a compliment to 
Tarlton, Kempe's great predecessor as a comic actor. The name 
may be a corruption of the Danish yi?>'^, or of the Roricus of Saxo- 
Grammaticus. This Roricus was Hamlet's grandfather. Mr. 
Latham identifies Yorick with the Eric who plays Claudius' part in 
the German version of the play; and suggests that the idea of his 
being a jester may be a confusion due to existence of some Gesta 
Erici Regis. Is not this a little far-fetched? 

• 211. on a roar. The nearest parallel is Rape of Lucrece, 1494 — 

" For sorrow, like a heavy -hanging bell 

Once set on ringing, with his own weight goes ". 

213. Cf. iii. I. 148. 

240. The personal note of the remainder of the scene is a curious 
contrast to the impersonal generalized tone of the speculations 
in which Hamlet has just been indulging. Observe that he has 
only just reached Elsinore and knows nothing of Ophelia's fate. 
It is not revealed to him until line 264, where Laertes speaks of ' my 
sister '. 

All the dialogue that follows has the rhythmical dignity of a 
dirge; see, e.g.., the speeches beginning with lines 249, 261, 266, 
277, 292. 

244. it; cf. ii. I. 216, note. 

250. doubtful. There is nothing in the description of Ophelia's 
death given by Gertrude in iv. 7. 163, sqq., to show that it was 
voluntary. 

255. her virgin crants. Q 2 has crants, F i rites. Warburton 
proposed chants, but ' crants ' is probably the same word as the 
' corances ' of Chapman's Alphonsus. It signifies ' crowns ' or 
' garlands ', and refers here to the garlands which it was customary 
to carry before the biers of unmarried women and then to hang up in 
the church. 

256. the bringing home. A funeral is here compared to the pro- 
cession of a bride from church. The same idea is the motive of a 
beautiful ^/^^ by Mr. Robert Bridges {Shorter Poems, ^. 16). Cf. 
also Romeo and Juliet, iv. i. 84. 

261. Even Laertes, shallow and debauched boy as he is, is digni- 
fied and ennobled by sorrow. His love for his sister is the redeeming 
point in him. 



i82 HAMLET. Act V. 

363. violets are Ophelia's flowers throughout; cf. i. 3. 7; iv. 
5- 184. 

Cf. also Persius, Satire i. 

" e tumulo fortunataque favilla 
Nascentur violse " ; 

and Tennyson, In Memoriam, xviii. — 

" 'Tis well; 'tis something; we may stand 
Where he in English earth is laid, 
And from his ashes may be made 
The violets of his native land". 

269. treble woe. So Q 2; F i has tei-rible woei\ 

276. Olympus, Pelion, and Ossa are three mountains in the north 
of Thessaly. The Giants, warring with the Gods, are said to havQ 
piled them upon each other in an attempt to scale heaven. 

277. blue, again the ' picturesque ' epithet. 
279. the wandering stars, the planets. 

290. Hamlet has forgotten everything else, his delayed revenge, 
his mother's sin, his own danger, even his pessimism, everything 
but just the love which he had put from him. He is a philosopher, 
but his action is usually swayed by impulse. 

292. I loved Ophelia. Cf the denial of iii. i. 115, 120, 'I loved 
you once..T loved you not'. 

299, Woo't drink up eisel. This line is one of the half-dozen 
cruces of the play. Q I reads vessels^ Q 2 Esill, F i Esile. There 
are two plausible explanations, between which the reader may 
choose : 

(i) Some river may be intended, and if so, it is probably the 
Yssel^ a northern branch of the Rhine, which runs not far from 
Denmark. Steevens, however, conjectured Weissel, Hanmer Nile, 
and Elze Nihis, the two latter being probably led by the mention of 
crocodiles. 

(ii) Theobald proposed eisel, meaning 'vinegar'; cf. Glossary, 
s.v. The advantage of this explanation is that it suggests a nasty 
drink, corresponding to such an unsavoury food as a crocodile, rather 
than an impossibly huge one. 

305. Almost insensibly Hamlet has slipped from the expression of 
real feeling into the half-simulated extravagances, the ' wild and 
whirling words ' that have become almost a second nature to him. 

306. Ossa ; cf. line 276, note. 

307-311. Q 2 gives these lines to the Queen; F i, in error, to 
the King. 



Scene 2.] NOTES. 183 

310. her golden couplets. The dove never lays niore than two 
eggs, and the young, when first hatched, are covered with a golden 
down. 

315. The idea is, ' Nothing can prevent inferior creatures, such as 
Laertes, from following their natvire, and now and then they get a 
chance to come to the front '. The proverbial expression, ' Every 
dog hath his day' is found in four other places in Elizabethan 
literature. In spite of this the emendation proposed by Mr. Street, 
dog will have his bay, is so plausible that I incline to adopt it. 

Scene 2. 

It is necessary first that Hamlet's reappearance should be explained. 
This is done by his narrative to Horatio. Then follows the brief 
scene with Osric, which declares Hamlet's character to be funda- 
mentally unchanged ; and then comes the end. Hamlet's revenge is 
accomplished at last, not dehberately, but by a sudden impulse, and 
at what a cost ! Claudius died justly, but — over and beyond Ophelia 
— the blood that is shed is at Hamlet's door. ' The rest is silence ', 
and the entry of Fortinbras and Hamlet's dying submission sym- 
bolize the triumph of another order of mind. 

I. this, the fate of Ophelia; the other, Hamlet's adventures. 

6. Rashly. This is more characteristic of Hamlet than he knows : 
if he is effective at all, it is always rashly, from impulse, and not 
from a ' deep plot '. 

g. pall. So Q 2; F i \s3& park; Pope suggested t^z'/. 

10. The metaphor is from the making of skewers or some such 
thing. 

21. Cf. iv. 3. 60, sqq. 

22. This is generally explained, ' "With the suggestion of such 
dangers, if I am allowed to live '. I think it means rather ' With 
such exaggeration of the actual facts of my life '. 

31. they, not 'my enemies' but 'my brains'. HanJet means 
that under the stress of circumstances he acted without stopping to 
think it over. 

33. A piece of affectation which only a clever young man of 
Hamlet's type could be guilty of. Cf. Montaigne (tr. Florio, 1603, 
p. 125) "I have in my time seen some, who by writing did earnestly 
get both their titles and living, to disavow their apprentisage, mar 
their pen, and affect the ignorance of so vulgar a quality ". 

42. a comma 'tween their amities. I think Johnson explains 
this rightly, " A comma is the note of connection and continuity of 
sentences ; the period is the note of abruption and disjunction ". 
But various editors have thought it necessary to conjecture commere, 
comate, cement, and so forth. 



1 84 HAMLET. [Act V. 

47- Cf. i. 5- 77- 

57. I doubt if we have the materials to say whether Rosencrantz 
and Guildenstern were fully aware of the tenor of their commission 
to England. In the Hystorie of Hamblett they are certainly guilty. 
But in any case they had already (ii. 2. 282, sqq.) given Hamlet 
proof of their willingness to sacrifice friendship to the bidding of the 
king. 

61. the pass and fell incensed points. These are merely 
two ways of expressing the same idea. In fencing you make the 
pass with the point. 

63. Does it not. ..stand me now upon. Is it not imperative 
upon me? Cf Richard III. iv. 2. 59 — 

" It stands me much upon 
To stop all hopes " ; 

and Richard II. ii. 3. 138, "It stands your grace upon". The 
similar phrase 'It lies on' occurs in Coriolamis, iii. 2. 52, "It lies 
you on to speak ". See Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 204. 

65. One of Hamlet's few allusions to his disinheritance. 

68-82. These lines are not in Q 2. 

73. the interim is mine. A reflection likely to give Hamlet 
satisfaction; an interim — a further chance of delay. 

78. court. So Rowe for the count of Qq. Ff. I think that the 
emendation is justified by line 237. 

80. Osric, a type of the empty-headed courtier or man about 
town, the affected fribble, parleying Euphuism or the Sidneian 
tongue, and so covering his nothingness with a nicety of borrowed 
phrase. 

84. this water-iiy, this ephemeral frail creature that flits so idly 
over the surface of a tragic pool. 

89. a chough. The idea is probably rather ' an ignorant provin- 
cial' than 'a chattering crow'. See Glossary, s.v. 

94. Cf. the scene with Polonius, iii. 2. 391, sqq. Theobald 
quotes Juvenal, Satire iii. 

' ' igniculum brumae si tempore poscas, 
Accipit endromidem ; si dixeris, gestuas, sudet ". 

108. Cf Love''s Laboi'.r^s Lost, v. I. 103, "I do beseech thee 
remember thy courtesy ; I beseech thee apparel thy head ". The 
phrase is a curious one. It was etiquette or courtesy to stand bare- 
headed before a superior, and yet perhaps a higher courtesy to omit 
the ceremony when requested. But this refinement is not in Osric. 

109-142 {108-T40). These lines are omitted in F I. 



Scene 2.] NOTES. 185 

112. differences, qualities that distinguish him from ordinary 
men; cf. the heraldic use (iv. 5. 183, note). 

113. feelingly, with insiglit and nice perception. 

114. the card or calendar of gentry. The metaphor may be 
from the shipman's card {Macbeth, i. 3. 17) or chart, by which a ship's 
course is directed ; or more likely from some card or booklet giving 
rules of etiquette. So in Lyly a ' card ' is a set of moral precepts or 
examples. 

117. Hamlet parodies Osric, and succeeds in making himselt 
quite unintelligible to him in his own tongue. 

120. yet but yaw neither, and yet but stagger in the attempt 
to overtake his perfections; cf. Glossary, s.v. yaw. Q 3 \vdA yet btit 
i-aw. Staunton suggested and wit but yaw ; Tschischwitz and yet 
btit row. 

131. in another tongue. Horatio is sarcastic. 'What! you 
can chatter in a jargon that is certainly not English ; can't you under- 
stand in it too? pray try'. 

162. ' You want a comment in the margin to explain the text.' 

172. It is difficult to make out from Osric exactly what the wager 
is. Probably 'a dozen' is a vague general term. The king bets 
that Laertes will not make as much as twelve hits for Hamlet's nine. 
It might of course take twenty-one passes to decide this. 

igo {188). Hamlet's courtesies are becoming a little irritable. 

196 {192). So Q 2. F I has mine {nine F 2) more of the same bevy. 
I am inclined to suggest many more of the same bread, to help out the 
' yesty ' metaphor below. 

200. fond and winnowed. So F i. Q 2 has prophane and tren- 
nowed', Warburton proposed fanned and winnowed, Johnson sane 
and renowned, Tschischwitz profound and winnowed; Nicholson 
thinks that the second word is vinewed or fenowed {i.e. 'rotten'). 
The F I text may stand, in the sense of ' foolish and over-refined '. 
The whole speech is obscure. Osric is a type of the foolish young 
man about town^ who picks up the phrases and tricks of style fashion- 
able at the moment, and uses them without any originality or under- 
standing ; who parleys Euphuism after Lyly, and Arcadianism after 
Sidney. Hamlet says of him and his kind that they have only got the 
slang of the day and its manner of dialogue. These borrowings (or 
' collection ') act as yeast to ' raise ' or fill with bubbles the bread of 
their absurd and fantastic opinions : if you blow them to their 
trial {i.e. talk to them with any originality in their own vein) the 
bubbles burst, their golden words are spent. 

203-218 {ig8-2i6). These Hnes are omitted in F i. 



186 HAMLET. [Act V. 

222. With Hamlet's presentiment of coming evil compare that of 
Antonio in Merchant of Venice, i. i, and that of Hermione in The 
Winter's Tale, ii. i. 

231. Cf. S. Matthew, x. 29, "Are not two sparrows sold for a 
farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your 
Father ". 

234. The text is Johnson's. Q 2 reads since no man of ought he 
leaves, knowes what ist to leave betimes, let be ; and F i since no man 
ha's ought of what he leaves. What isH to leave betimes? 

260. 'An opinion and precedent to show that I am justified in 
making peace.' The wish to be right with the public opinion of his 
world is characteristic of Laertes. 

266. For the double meaning of foil, see Glossary, s.v. The use 
of the pun, to produce a grimly ironical effect, is quite in Shake- 
speare's later manner, after the mere delight in punning for its own 
sake had disappeared. 

274. he is better'd, he has the better reputation. The odds 
have been really laid on Laertes, so the phrase ' laid the odds ' in 
line 272 must be taken in the general sense of ' made a bet '. 

283. union. So F i. Q 2 has unice; Q 3 onixe. 

285. Cf. i. 2. 285. Commentators quote several illustrations of 
this noisy Danish custom. 

293. The so-called 'union' is doubtless poison in reality. 

298. fat, and scant of breath. It has been thought that this is 
an unpoetic description of ' ' the glass of fashion and the mould of 
form ", and that it is to be explained by the physical peculiarities of 
the actor Burbage. Very probably ' fat ' means little more than 
' out of training '. 

310. ' You trifle with me as if I were a child.' 

312. They change rapiers. This stage-direction may be explained 
in three ways : — 

(i) Both swords maybe knocked out of the combatants' hands, 
and in the hurry each may pick up his opponent's ; or 

(2) Laertes only may drop his sword ; Hamlet may put his foot on 
it, and courteously offer his own. This was Salvini's way of playing 
the scene; or 

(3) Laertes may try to disarm Hamlet by gripping the hilt of his 
sword at close quarters. In a fencing school Hamlet's proper reply 
would be to perform the same manoeuvre, and so the two would 
change weapons. 

317. Cf. i. 3. 115, note. 

343. of it, of Hamlet's death. 



Scene 2.] NOTES. 1^7 

347. Ci. Sylvester, Translation Oj Du Bartas— 

"And death, dread serjeant of the th' eternal Judge, 
Comes very late to his sole -seated lodge ". 

as, an ellipse, ' Had I but time — which I have not, as '. 
352. Cf. Macbeth, v. 8. I— 

"Why should I play the Roman fool, and die 
On mine own sword?" 

354. a wounded name; cf. line 261, "to keep my name un- 
gored ". 

358. felicity, the felicity of death, the "consummation devoutly to 
be wished ". 

375. cries on havoc, cries out against the butchery. 

376. eternal. It is suggested that here, and in i. 5. 21, Julius 
CcEsa?', i. 2. 160, Othello, iv. 2. 130, 'eternal' is used for 'infernal'. 
But the usual sense of ' eternal ' world at least fit this passage and 
that in Julius Ccesar. 

383. his mouth, the king's. 

400. rights of memory, claims which are not forgotten. 



APPENDIX A. 



THE FIRST QUARTO OF 1603. 

It is difficult, without actually reprinting the Q i version oiHamlet, 
to give an exact idea of its character and its divergencies from the 
received text. The student should by all means read it for himself 
in Griggs' facsimile, or better still, in Dr. Wilhelm Victor's parallel 
text edition (No. 2 of Shakespeare Reprints, Marburg, 1 891), It is 
also to be found in Furness' New Variorum Hamlet, vol. ii.., and 
in the Cambridge Shakespeare, vol. ix. I propose, however, in this 
Appendix to briefly mention the points on the consideration of which 
the theory as to the nature of Q I given in the Introduction is based. 
They appear to me to justify the three following propositions : — 

A. Q I is an imperfect and mutilated copy of the play. 

B. The version from which it was taken was different from that 

represented by Q 2 and F I. 

C. This version, as well as the later one, was the work of Shake- 

speare. 

I will take these in their turn. 

A. There can be no doubt that whatever Q I represents it repre- 
sents it very badly. In many places it is so garbled and mutilated 

Q I a muti- that it would be unintelligible without a knowledge of 

lated copy. the later texts. It is most probably one of the ' stolen 
and surreptitious copies ' mentioned in the preface to the folio of 1623. 
And I think we may assume that it was not stolen from any written 
copy of the play. No combination of an imperfect draft and a mole- 
eyed printer would be sufficient to account for the result. Moreover, 
the errors are in many cases manifestly due to mishearing and not to 
misreading. The more probable hypothesis is that the printer sent 
an agent to the theatre while Hamlet was being acted, and that he, 
with or without the aid of shorthand, took down such notes as he 
could of the dialogue ■"■. These were afterwards strung together 

1 Shorthand was invented before 1602. The schemes proposed in Timothy 
Bright's Ckaracterie (1588) and Bales' Art of Brachygrapkie (1590) are not of 
much use; but John WilUs' Art of Stenographie (1602) is more practical. The 
method was certainly used for pirating plays. Heywood complains of it in two 
or three places. In the prologue to the Rape of Lucrece (1608), he speaks of it 
being only ' copied by the ear', and in that to If you know me, you know Nobody, 
he says that the audience — 

"Did throng the seats, the boxes, and the stage 
So much that some by stenography drew 
The plot : put it in print : scarce one word true ". 

Cf. also Marston's Malecontent, and Webster's The Devil's Law Case (1623)— 
" Do you hear, officers ! 

You must take great care that you let in no brachygraphy men to take notes". 
See Levy, Shakespeaje and Shorthand. 



APPENDIX A. 189 

into something resembling a play. They were in parts extremely 
scanty, and were either left incomplete or else very roughly pieced 
out. It has been suggested that some hack-poet was employed to 
revise them; but that is extremely unlikely. Not Chettle, nor 
Munday, nor any of Henslowe's crew of scribblers could have pro- 
duced quite such an indigesta moles. Their lines might have lacked 
wit and imagination, but they would at least have made sense, and 
to some extent have scanned. And the same reasons which make it 
unlikely that Q I was printed from a written text dispose of the idea 
that a sight of the ' prompter's copy ' was obtained for the revision ; 
it is, however, just possible that two or three of the subordinate 
actors may have lent their 'parts'.^ The speeches belonging to 
Horatio, Marcellus, and Voltemar are perhaps better represented than 
the rest. 

Those characteristics of Q I which may fairly be attributed to the 
shortcomings of the reporter fell under four main heads. 

i. He appears to have left out bits of the dialogue here and there. 
In a few places this can be shown almost with certainty. Thus, for 
i. 4. 69-71 Q r has — 

" What if it tempt you toward the flood my Lord, 
That heckles ore his bace into the sea". 

Here it is pretty obvious that the line 

"Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff" 

has been dropped out. This being so, it is natural to suppose that 
the same thing has occurred in other passages, and especially where 
Q I only gives a line or two at the beginning and another line or two 
at the end of what appears as a long speech in Q 2. The shortness of 
the play in Q I confirms this view. It contains only 2143 lines to the 
3891 of the Globe text. But it is impossible to say how much of this 
is due to omissions, and how much to a fuller expansion in Q 2 of 
the first form of the play. 

ii. In many passages the words have been taken down nearly 
right, but the reporter has failed to observe the proper distribution 
into lines, and has replaced it by one of his own. Thus part of 
Hamlet's soliloquy in i. 2 becomes — 

" O God within two moneths ; no not two ; maried, 
Mine uncle : O let me not thinke of it. 
My father's brother : but no more like 
My father, then I \.o Hercules. 
Within two months ere yet the salt of most 
Unrighteous teares had left their flushing 
In her galled eyes : she married, O God, a beast 
Devoyd of reson would not have made 
Such speede : Frailtie, thy name is Woman, 
Why she would hang on him, as if increase 
Of appetite had growne by what it looked on ". 

■^ Actors' parts appear to have been copied for them on pasteboards, known as 
'plats' or 'cards' (cf. v. i. 149, note). Some of these are still extant: three, The 
Battle of Alcazar, Frederick and Basilea, and The Dead Maiis Fortune, have 
been facsimiled for Mr, Halliwell-Phillipps. 



I90 HAMLET. 

Similarly prose is often printed as if it were verse, and verse some- 
times as prose. 

iii. Often the reporter's hearing has failed him, and he has put 
down, instead of the words actually spoken, others resembling them 
in sound. This is the origin of such mistakes as 'impudent' for 'im- 
potent' (i. 2. 29), 'right done' for 'writ down' (i. 2. 223), 'cere- 
monies ' for ' cerements ' (i_. 4. 48), ' martin ' for ' matin ' (i. 5. 89). 

iv. Where the notes are very scanty and the reporter has forgotten 
the context, he has strung them together with words of his own. The 
result is a curious medley of Shakespearian phrases bereft of their 
meaning like a church-window filled with fragments of glass from 
some shattered design. Thus, for i. 2. loi sqq. Q 2 has — 

"It is a fault gainst heaven, fault gainst the dead, 
A fault gainst nature, and in reason's 
Common course most certain 
None lives on earth, but he is born to die ". 

Here the reporter seems to have been misled by some note of the 
words 'from the first corpse (course Q 2)', and to have turned reason's 
' common theme ' into ' common course '. 

B. After making all allowance for the reporter's haphazard way 
of working, I cannot persuade myself that the Ha77ilet which he saw 
Q I a different ^^ the theatre and tried to reproduce was the Hai^ilet of 
version to Q 2 Q 2. There are wide differences between the two ver- 
and F i. sions which none of the blundering mental processes 

just enumerated are adequate to explain. They are, however, quite 
consistent with the theory that we have in Q I a slovenly version of 
an early and crude form of the play. 

i. The order of the scenes is slightly different from that of Q 2. 
The chief variation is that the 'To be or not to be ' soliloquy and 
the interview between Hamlet and Ophelia (iii. i in Q 2) precede 
in Q I the ' fishmonger ' scene with Polonius and the entry of the 
players (ii. 2 in Q 2). 

ii. Many of the names of the characters are different. Leartes, 
Ofelia, Gertred^ Cornelia, Voltemar, Rossencraft, Gildersfone, may 
be mere corruptions aided by mishearing for the Laertes, Ophelia, 
Gerirard or Gertrad {Gertrude, F i), Corneliits, Volteniand, Rosen- 
crans or Rosencraus {Rosincrance F i ), Guildensterne of Q 2. Duke and 
Duchess for King oxid Queen (iii. 2. 165) are of no importance. But 
some further explanation is needful of the substitution of Gonzago for 
Alberttcs (iii. 2. 250), and of Polonius and Reynaldo for Corambis 
and Montano. Let alone the Corai7ibus in the German play (Intro- 
duction, pp. 12, 13, and Appendix C) and the traces of the old names 
in the stage-directions of Q 2 (cf. notes to i. 2. I and ii. i. l), no- 
thing will persuade me to the theory gravely held by Dr. Tanger 
that these are mere mistakes due to similarity of sound. Other 
instances of the change of names at the revision of a play are to be 
found in the Petruchio and Grumio of The Taming of the Shrew, 
which replace the Rerando and Sander oi The Taming of a Shrew, 



APPENDIX A. 191 

and in Ben Jonson's Every Man out of his Hianour, where the Italian 
names of the first version give way to English ones in the second. 

iii. There are passages where the Q I text does not appear to be 
corrupt, but where it yet differs widely from Q 2, and as a rule is 
markedly inferior in richness of vocabulary and depth of thought. 
Such differences appear to point directly to revision. Excellent 
instances may be found in Ophelia's two speeches concerning Hamlet. 
Cf. with the iii. I. 158 sqq. of Q 2, the following of Q I : — 

" Great God of heaven, what a quick change is this? 
The Courtier Scholar Soldier, all in him 
All dasht and splintered thence, O woe is me, 
To a scene what I a seene, see what I see ". 

And this with the ii. i. 77 sqq. of Q 2 — 

"O young Prince Hamlet, the only floure of Denmark, 
Hee is bereft of all the wealth he had. 
The Jewell that adorn'd his feature most 
Is filcht and stolne away, his wit's bereft him. 
Hee found mee walking in the gallery all alone. 
There comes hee to mee with a distracted looke. 
His garters lagging downe, his shooes untide, 
And fixt his eyes so stedfast on my face 
As if they had vow'd, this is their latest object. 
Small while he stoode, but gripes me by the wrist. 
And there he holdes my pulse till with a sigh 
He doth unclaspe his holde, and parts away 
Silent, as is the mid time of the night : 
And as he went, his eie was still on mee. 
For thus his head ouer his shoulder looked. 
He seemed to finde the way without his eies: 
For out of doores he went without their helpe. 
And so did leave me." 

I do not think that the same hand which garbled the other parts 
out of the play is likely to have produced these neat paraphrases. 

iv. There are other passages in Q I which have no representatives 
at all in Q 2. Only a few of these are of any length. One is given 
in the notes to iii. 2. 52; another is a scene between Horatio and 
Gertrude which comes between iv. 5 and iv. 6 of the received text. 
It is hard to see how these can have come into existence if they were 
not part of the play as heard by the reporter. 

V. In several important respects the characterization of Q I is 
different from that of Q 2. I do not dwell on the point that Hamlet 
himself is far less subtly represented. This may be merely the 
result of the accidental omission by the reporter of some of the 
delicate touches in the delineation of the complete play. But there 
are at least two variations which must surely be deliberate. One is 
that our sense of Laertes' guilt is diminished by the fact that in Q i 
the proposal to use a poisoned foil comes not from him, but from 
Claudius. The other, that the character of Gertrude is put in quite 
a different light. In Q 2 the extent of her guilt is left vague and 
doubtful, and to the end she wavers between husband and son. In 
Q I she is made to protest very definitely her innocence of the murder, 
and thenceforward to show herself a strong partisan of Hamlet's. 



192 HAMLET. 

This is her position in the Historie of Hamlet also, and the modifica- 
tion of it shown in Q 2 seems to me clearly the result of design. It 
was Shakespeare's intention that Hamlet should stand alone. 

C. Assuming then that Q i and Q 2 represent two successive forms 
of Hamlet, a first sketch and a revision, are we justified in treating 
Both ver- them both as the work of Shakespeare ; or ought we to 
sions by suppose that the first sketch contains any appreciable 

Shakespeare, amount of the pre-Shakespearian Hatnlet, in the exis- 
tence of which we have good reason to believe (Appendix B)? I 
prefer the former view, although the Clarendon Press editors give the 
weight of their authority to a theory that Q I is the early Ha^nlet 
partly revised by Shakespeare, and that this revision had not gone 
much beyond act ii. I do not accept this. I believe that Q i is 
Shakespeare's independent treatment of the subject suggested to him 
by the older play. If he borrowed anything beyond the outline of 
the plot, it was probably the fooling, meant to tickle the groundlings, 
at the end of i. 5. It is true that the three last acts are not only more 
incoherent in themselves than the two earlier, but also that they 
depart more from Q 2 ; but this is capable of many explanations. 
The reporter may have grown tired of his task. So far as the 
dialogue goes, in the few places where we get it uncorrupted there 
is nothing inconsistent with its being Shakespeare's. It is not all 
at his highest level ; it may have been hastily written for a provincial 
tour, and one need hardly be surprised that what is retained in 
Q 2 is better than what is rejected; but it does not, any of it, appear 
to have any affinity with the kind of thing that the pre-Shakespearian 
Hajnlet probably was. I do not want, however, to lay too much 
stress on this question of style, for after all, the passages in question 
are necessarily the more colourless and commonplace, and I do not 
believe that I or anyone else have a sufficiently acute critical sense 
to say definitely of such that they are or are not Shakespeare's. 
Much more important is the essential identity, in other respects than 
style, of even the last three acts of Q I with Q 2. Almost all the 
details, the incidents and touches of characterization, the deep and 
imaginative sayings, are there at least in germ. I need only endorse 
Mr. Furnivall's remark, that if Q i is not Shakespeare's, then ' ' the 
credit of three-fifths of the character of Hamlet, and about one-half 
of the working out of it, belong to the author of the old Harnlef\^ 



APPENDIX B. 

THE PRE-SHAKESPEARIAN HAMLET. 

There are several allusions in contemporary literature to a play on 
Hamlet, which can hardly have been Shakespeare's, at the close of 

'^ Forewords to Qiiarto 2, 1604. (Griggs' Facsimile.) 



APPENDIX B. 193 

the sixteenth and beginning of the seventeenth centuries. It is worth 
while to collect them here, 

1. From an epistle by Thomas Nash, prefixed to Greene's Mena- 
phon: Camilla's alar77i to slumbering Euphues, 1589 — 

"He turne backe to my first text, of studies of delight, and talke a 
little in friendship with a few of our triviall translators. It is a 
common practice now a dales amongst a sort of shifting companions, 
that runne through every arte and thrive by none to leave the trade 
of Noveri7it whereto they were borne, and busie themselves with the 
endevours of art, that could scarcelie latinize their necke verse if 
they should have neede ; yet English Seneca read by candle-light 
yeeldes manie good sentences, as Blould is a beggar, and so foorth : 
and if you intreate him faire in a frostie morning, he will afoord you 
whole Hamlets, I should say Handfulls of tragical speaches. But O 
grief! Tempus edax reruiw, — what is it that will last always? The 
sea exhaled by drops will in continuance be drie ; and Seneca, let 
bloud line by line, and page by page, at length must needs die to our 
stage. " 

It has been thought possible that although Menaphon was not 
published until 1589, Nash's Epistle may have been written as early 
as 1587. 

2. From the Diary of Philip Henslowe for 1594, while the Lord 
Chamberlain's and the Lord Admiral's men were playing for him at 
Newington Butts — 

"9. of June 1594. Rd. at hamlet, viijs." 

The play appears only to have been played once at this time, and 
is not marked n[ew] e[nterlude]. 

3. From Lodge's Wifs miserie, and the World's mad^iesse, 1596 — 
" [Hate Virtue is] a foul lubber, and looks as pale as the wisard of 

the ghost, which cried so miserally at the theator, like an oyster- 
wife, Hamlet revenge". 

4. The following, though subsequent to the First Quarto ot 1603, 
may possibly refer to the early play. The actual phrase " Hamlet 
revenge," does not occur in the text of Shakespeare's play, as it has 
reached us, though the exhortation to revenge is given in other 
words in i. 5. 8, and i. 5. 25. 

From Dekker's Satiromastix, 1602 — 

^'' Ashiius. Wod I were hanged if I can call you any names but 
Capitaine and Tucca. 

Tucca. No. Fye'st; my name's Hamlet revenge: thou hast 
been at Parris garden, hast not?" 

Tucca comes on "his boy after him, with two pictures under his 
cloak"; cf. iii. 4. 53. 

5. From Westward Hoe, 1 607 — 

"I, but when light wives make heavy husbands, let these hus- 
bands play mad Hamlet; and crie revenge" . 

6. From Armin's Nest of Nineties, 1608 — 

" ther are, as Hamlet saies, things cald whips in store". 
< 885 ) N 



194 



HAMLET. 



Ci. iii. I. 70, note. 

7. From Rowland's The Night Raven, 1618 — 

"I will not cry Hamlet Reuenge my greeves, But I will call 
Hang-man Retienge on theeves". 

An attempt has been made to show that Shakespeare's play be- 
longs to the sixteenth century, on the strength of the following MS. 
note in Gabriel Harvey's copy of Speght's Chaucer — 

' ' The younger sort take much delight in Shakespeare's Ve^tics and 
Adonis, but his Lucrece and his tragedy of Hamlet Prince of Den- 
marke, have it in them to please the wiser sort ". 

But though Harvey doubtless purchased the volume in 1598, as 
this date occurs both at the beginning and end of it, the MS. notes 
therein appear to have been written at various subsequent times. 

We may gather from the above passages that the play was known 
at least as early as 1589 (possibly 1587) ; that it was played at_ the 
Theater, at Newington Butts, and at Paris Garden ; that it contained 
the ghost; and that the phrase, "Hamlet revenge", made an im- 
pression on the popular imagination. 

Mr. Fleay [Biographical Chronicle of the English Drama, s.v. 
Kyd, ii.. 26) suggests that the author of this older Hamlet was 
Thomas Kyd. It certainly appears likely that the attack in Nash's 
epistle to Menaphon was aimed at him. 



APPENDIX C 

"FRATRICIDE PUNISHED." 

Most of our information respecting the early performances of 
English plays in Germany is derived from Cohn's invaluable Shake- 
speare in Germany, to which the student is referred for further infor- 
mation. The following facts bear upon the relations of Fratricide 
Punished to our Hamlet. 

(i) In Heywood's Apology for Actors (ed. Shakesp. Soc. p. 40) 
it is stated that ' ' the King of Denmarke, father to him that now 
reigneth, entertained into his service a company of English 
comedians, commended unto him by the honourable the Earle of 
Leicester ". 

(2) Cohn shows that this king was Frederick II., who died 1588. 
Leicester's players went to the court of the Elector of Saxony in 
1586, subsequently returned to England and became the nucleus of 
the company with which Shakespeare was connected throughout his 
dramatic career. See Fleay, Chronicle of the London Stage, passim. 

(3) There is a diary kept by an officer of the Saxon court at 
Dresden in 1626, which contains a list of plays performed by ' the 
English actors '. Amongst these occurs Ha7nlet a Prince in Den- 
marck. 



APPENDIX D. 



195 



(4) The existing text of Fratricide Punished is from a MS. dated 
' Pretz, den 27 October, 17 10'. It is printed by Cohn, and trans- 
lated in Furness' New Variorum Hamlet, ii. 121. 

Dr. Latham {Two Dissertatioris on Hamlet, 1872) argues, but not, 
I think, very conclusively, that the date of Fratricide Punished can 
be fixed to about 1589, by an allusion to the expedition to Portugal 
in that year. 



APPENDIX D. 

THE 'TRAVELLING' OF THE PLAYERS (Act ii. 
scene 2, line 343). 

The passage in which Rosencrantz explains the reasons why 
Hamlet's favourite company of tragedians are 'travelling' appears in 
a different form in each of the three versions. They may here be 
given together for purposes of comparison. 

FIRST QUARTO. 

Hajn. How comes it that they trauell ? Do they grow restie ? 
Gil. No my lord, their reputation holds as it was wont. 
Ham. How then? 
Gil. Yfaith my Lord, noueltie carries it away, 

For the principall publike audience that 

Came to them, are turned to private playes, 

And to the humour of children. 

SECOND QUARTO. 

Ham. How chances it they trauaile? their residence both in reputation, and profit 

was better both wayes. 
Ros. I thinke their inhibition, comes by the means of the late innouasion. 
Ham. Doe they hold the same estimation they did when I was in the City ; are 

they so followed ? 
Ros. No indeede are they not. 

FIRST FOLIO. 

Ham. How chances it they trauaile ? their residence both in reputation and profit 
was better both wayes. 

Rosin. I thinke their Inhibition comes by the meanes of the late Innouation? 

Ham. Doe they hold the same estimation they did when I was in the City? Are 
they so follow'd? 

Rosi?i. No indeed, they are not. 

Ham. How comes it ? Doe they grow rusty ? 

Rosin. Nay, their indeauour keepes in the wonted pace ; But there is Sir an ayrie 
of Children, little Yases, that crye out on the top of question ; and are 
most tyrannically clap't for 't : these are now the fashion, and so 
be-ratled the common Stages (so they call them) that many wearing 
Rapiers, are affraide of Goose-quils, and dare scarce come thither. 

It will be seen that the reason for the ' travelling ' assigned in Q i 
is the popularity of a rival company, of children; in Q 2 an 'in- 
hibition ' due to an ' innovation ' ; in F 2, both these causes are men- 
tioned. 

The title-page of Q i shows us that Hamlet, in the early days of its 
career, was acted out of London. It is not unnatural, therefore, to 



196 HAMLET. 

seek in this passage an allusion to some 'travelling' of Shakespeare's 
own company, which may help to determine the date of the play. It 
will be well to take the two points separately. 

i. The ''Inhibition'' and ^ Innovation \ — It would appear that 
' inhibition ' was a technical term for an order restraining theatrical 
performances, or the performances of a particular company, from 
taking place in London. The ' inhibition ' here spoken of has been 
identified with various such orders issued at different times during 
the long struggle between the theatrical or court and the anti- 
theatrical or city parties, represented respectively by the Privy 
Council and the Corporation. (See Halliwell-Phillipps, Otdlines of 
the Life of Shakespeare, and Fleay, Chronicle History of the London 
Stage. ) So, too, the ' innovation ' has been interpreted as ' the new 
practice of introducing polemical matter on the stage', or 'the new- 
morals of the Puritan party '. But we are helped to a better ex- 
planation by the fuller knowledge of the history of the Globe 
company, which is due chiefly to Mr. Fleay. In 1 60 1 the company 
was in disgrace at court owing to the share they had taken in the 
conspiracy of Essex and Southampton. A performance of Richard 
II. had been given by them to encourage the conspirators.^ For the 
OTily time during a long period of years they were not invited to take 
part in the Christmas festivities. Probably they travelled during 
the autumn; they seem to have been at Aberdeen in October^ and 
at Cambridge about the same date;^ and if so, this is most likely the 
' travelling ' alluded to in the play. Then the ' inhibition ' will be 
the refusal of permission to act at court, and the ' innovation ', the 
political innovation or conspiracy which led to it. 

ii. The Aery of Children. — Can this allusion also be referred to 
this same year, 1601? • It was just at this time that the children of 
the Chapel Royal were acting at the Blackfriars. They took a 
prominent part in the stage-controversy known as the ' war of the 
theatres', and amongst other plays they produced between 1597 and 
1603, Ben Jonson's Cynthia's Revels and his Poetaster, satirical 
plays, full of attacks on rival poets and players, and answering well 
to the description given in the text. Moreover, the Q I phrase, 'the 
humours of children', seems to point to Jonson's fondness for painting 
' humours ' or comic types. Witness the titles of his earlier plays. 
Every Man in his Htimour and Every Man out of his Humour. If 
the allusion has been correctly identified, Hamlet may be the play in 
which Shakespeare ' put down ' Ben Jonson.* 

1 See Mr. Hales' Notes attd Essays, and the Introduction to my edition of 
Richard II. (Falcon Series). 

2 Cf. Macbeth (Warwick Series), Introduction, p. 11, and the excursus on 
Shakespeare in Scotland in Knight's Shakespeare. 

3 Kempe and Burbage are introduced in the 2nd part of The Returne from 
Parnasstis, a Cambridge play with a local scene, probably written in 1601. (Cf. 
Macray's edition of the play, and Fleay, Biographical Chronicle of the English 
Drama, ii. 349.) 

* Cf. The Returne from Parnassus. Mr. Fleay, however, thinks that the play 
meant was Troiltts and Cressida. 



APPENDIX E. 



197 



The question remains, why was the point about the ' innovation ' 
omitted in Q l, and that about the children in Q 2? The first difficulty 
is easily explained. When the reporter went to the theatre, — pro- 
bably early in 1602, as the book was entered in the Stationers' 
Registers in July of that year, — Elizabeth was still on the throne. 
Whatever the Globe company chose to do in the provinces, they 
would have been ill-advised to allow any allusion to the facts of their 
disgrace to stand in the play when it was acted in town. Just in 
the same way, the most objectionable scene of Richard IL, from a 
political point of view, was omitted from the two editions of the play 
published in Elizabeth's lifetime. In 1604, however, the date of Q 2, 
she was dead, and such nice caution became no longer necessary. 
At the same time another change of circumstances led to the omis- 
sion of the attack on the player-children. By 1604 the so-called 
' war of the theatres ' was over, Jonson and Shakespeare were pro- 
bably friends again, and the latter had no desire to print anything 
discourteous to the former.^ In the meantime, however, the passage 
had been elaborated at the general revision of the play to the form 
in which it is found in F I. As to the re-appearance of both the 
allusions in 1623, probably they had remained throughout in the 
theatre copy of the play. When F i was published, both the matters 
to which they referred had become ancient history, and there was no 
reason why they should be suppressed. 



APPENDIX E. 

"DIDO, QUEEN OF CARTHAGE." 

It is worth while to reprint the passage from Dido, Queen of 
Carthage, parodied in Hamlet, act ii. sc. 2. The play was pub- 
lished, as by Marlowe and Nash, in 1594, the year after Marlowe's 
death. It is usually supposed to have been left incomplete by 
him, and finished by Nash. Mr. Fleay, however, thinks that it was 
an early play, written by the two in collaboration. The passage in 
question is from act ii. sc. i : — 

j^n 

At last came Pyrrhus, fell and full of ire, 

His harness dropping blood, and on his spear 

The mangled head of Priam't youngest son ; 

And, after him, his band of Myrmidons, 

With balls of wild-fire in their murdering paws, 

Which made the funeral flame that burnt fair Troy; 

All which hemmed me about, crying, "This is he ! " 
Dido. Ah, how could poor ^neas scape their hands? 

1 Cf. the omission, probably for similar reasons, in Q 2 of the attack upon 
Kempe, which appeared in Q i — iii. 2. 50, note. 



198 HAMLET. 

^En. My mother Venus, jealous of my health, 

Convey'd me from their crooked nets and bands ; 
So I escaped the furious Pyrrhus' wrath : 
Who then ran to the palace of the king, 
And at Jove's altar finding Priamus, 
About whose withered neck hung Hecuba, 
Folding his hand in hers, and jointly both 
Beating their breasts, and falling on the ground, 
He, with his falchion's point raised up at once. 
And with Megaera's eyes, star'd in their face, 
Threatening a thousand deaths at every glance : 
To whom the aged king thus, trembling, spoke; 
" Achilles' son, remember what I was, 
Father of fifty sons, but they are slain ; 
Lord of my fortune, but my fortune's turned : 
King of this city, but my Troy is fired ; 
And now am neither father, lord, nor king : 
Yet who so wretched but desires to live? 
O, let me live, great Neoptolemus ! " 
Not moved at all, but smiling at his tears. 
This butcher, whilst his hands were yet held up, 
Treading upon his breast, struck off his hands. 

Dido. O, end, ^neas ! I can hear no more. 

^n. At which the frantic queen leaped on his' face. 
And in his eyelids hanging by the nails, 
A little while prolonged her husband's life. 
At last, the soldiers pull'd her by the heels, 
And swung her howling in the empty air, 
Which sent an echo to the wounded king : 
Whereat he lifted up his bed-rid limbs, 
And would have grappled with Achilles' son. 
Forgetting both his want of strength and hands; 
Which he disdaining, whisk'd his sword about, 
And with the wind thereof the king fell down ; 
Then from the navel to the throat at once 
He ripp'd old Priam; at whose latter gasp 
Jove's marble statue gan to bend the brow. 
As loathing Pyrrhus for this wicked act. 
Yet he, undaunted, took his father's flag. 
And dipp'd it in the old king's chill-cold blood. 
And then in triumph ran into the streets. 
Through which he could not pass for slaughter'd men ; 
So, leaning on his sword, he stood stone-still, 
Viewing the fire where with rich Ilion burnt. 



APPENDIX F. 

GOETHE AND COLERIDGE ON HAMLET. 

These two passages are the foundation of modern Shakespeare 
criticism : — 

(i) From Goethe's Wilhelm Meister [I'j^]. 

"I sought for every indication of what the character of Hamlet was 
before the death of his father ; I took note of all that this interesting 
youth had been, independently of that sad event, independently of 



APPENDIX F. 199 

the subsequent terrible occurrences, and I imagined what he might 
have been without them. 

" Tender and nobly descended, this royal flower grew up under the 
direct influences of majesty; the idea of the right and of princely 
dignity, the feeling for the good and the graceful, with the conscious- 
ness of his high birth, were Unfolded in him together. He was a 
prince, a born prince. Pleasing in figure, polished by nature, 
courteous from the heart, he was to be the model of youth and the 
delight of the world. 

"Without any supreme passion, his love for Ophelia was a pre- 
sentiment of sweet needs. His zeal for knightly exercises was not 
entirely his own, not altogether natural to him ; it had rather to be 
quickened and inflamed by praise bestowed upon another. Pure 
in sentiment, he knew the honourable-minded, and would prize the 
repose which an upright spirit enjoys, resting on the frank bosom of 
a friend. To a certain degree he had learned to discern and value 
the good and the beautiful in arts and sciences; the vulgar was 
offensive to him ; and if hatred could take root in his tender soul, it 
was only so far as to make him despise the false and fickle courtiers, 
and scornfully to play with them. He was calm in his temper, 
simple in his behaviour, neither content in idleness, nor yet too 
eager for employm-ent. An academic routine he seemed to continue 
even at court. He possessed more mirth of humour than of heart ; 
he was a good companion, compliant, modest, discreet, and could 
forget and forgive an injury; yet never able to unite himself with 
one who overstept the limits of the right, the good, and the becoming. 

" Figure to yourselves this youth, this son of princes, conceive him 
vividly, bring his condition before your eyes, and then observe him 
when he learns that his father's spirit walks ; stand by him in the 
terrible night when the venerable ghost itself appears before him. 
A horrid shudder seizes him : he speaks to the mysterious form ; he 
sees it beckon him ; he follows it and hearkens. The fearful accusa- 
tion of his uncle rings in his ears ; the summons to revenge, and the 
piercing reiterated prayer : ' Remember me ! ' 

' ' And when the ghost has vanished, whom is it we see standing 
before us? A young hero panting for vengeance? A born prince, 
feeling himself favoured in being summoned to punish the usurper of 
his crown? No! Amazement and sorrow overwhelm the solitary 
young man ; he becomes bitter against smiling villains, swears never 
to forget the departed, and concludes with the significant ejacula- 
tion : ' The time is out of joint : O cursed spite, that ever I was 
born to set it right ! ' 

"In these words, I imagine, is the key to Hamlet's whole pro- 
cedure. To me it is clear that Shakespeare sought to depict a great 
deed laid upon a soul unequal to the performance of it. In this view 
I find the piece composed throughout. Here is an oak tree planted 
in a costly vase, which should have received into its bosom only 
lovely flowers; the roots spread out, the vase is shivered to pieces. 



200 HAMLET. 

"A beautiful, jDure, noble, and most moral nature, without the 
strength of nerve which makes the hero, sinks beneath a burden 
which it can neither bear nor throw off; every duty is holy to him, 
. — this too hard. The impossible is required of him, — not the im- 
possible in itself, but the impossible to him. He winds, turns, 
agonizes, advances, and recoils, ever reminded, ever reminding him- 
self, and at last almost loses his purpose from his thoughts, without 
ever again recovering his peace of mind. " 

(2) From Coleridge's Notes and Lectures iipon Shakespeare (1808). 

" I believe the character of Hamlet may be traced to Shakespeare's 
deep and accurate science in mental philosophy. Indeed, that this 
character must have some connection with the common fundamental 
laws of our nature may be assumed from the -fact that Hamlet has 
been the darling of every country in which the literature of England 
hafS been fostered. In order to understand him, it is essential that 
we should reflect on the constitution of our own minds. Man is 
distinguished from the brute animals in proportion as thought pre- 
vails over sense ; but in the healthy processes of the mind, a balance 
is constantly maintained between the impressions from outward 
objects and the inward operations of the intellect; for if there be an 
overbalance in the contemplative faculty, man thereby becomes the 
creature of mere meditation, and loses his natural power of action. 
Now, one of Shakespeare's modes of creating characters is to con- 
ceive any one intellectual or moral faculty in morbid excess, and then 
to place himself, Shakespeare, thus mutilated or diseased, under 
given circumstances. In Hamlet he seems to have wished to 
exemplify the moral necessity of a due balance between our attention 
to the objects of our senses and our meditation on the working of our 
minds, — an equilibrium between the real and the imaginary worlds. 
In Hamlet this balance is disturbed ; his thoughts and the images of 
his fancy are far more vivid than his actual perceptions, and his very 
perceptions, instantly passing through the medizuji of his contempla- 
tions, acquire, as they pass, a form and a colour not naturally their 
own. Hence we see a great, an almost enormous, intellectual 
activity, and a proportionate aversion to real action consequent upon 
it, with all its symptoms and accompanying qualities. This character 
Shakespeare places in circumstances under which it is obliged to act 
on the spur of the moment. Hamlet is brave and careless of death ; 
but he vacillates from sensibility, and procrastinates from thought, 
and loses the power of action in the energy of resolve. Thus it is 
that the tragedy presents a direct contrast to that of Macbeth ; the 
one proceeds with the utmost slowness, the other with a crowded 
and breathless rapidity." 



ESSAY ON METRE.1 



§ I. Metre as an indication of Date. 

English blank verse did not come into use till the sixteenth century: 
and at the commencement of its career, the rules which regulated its 
employment were strict. It was only when the instrument was be- 
coming familiar that experiments could be ventured upon, and varia- 
tions and modifications freely introduced. The changes in the structure 
of blank verse between the time when Shakespeare commenced writing 
and the time of his retirement are great; and the variations in this 
respect are among the most important indications of the date of any 
given play. That is to say, broadly speaking, the less strictly regular 
the metre, the later the play. 

In the same way,, a gradually increasing disregard of other kindred 
conventions marks the later plays as compared with the earlier. A 
good deal of rhyme survives in the dialogue in the earlier plays; later 
it is only to be found occasionally at the close of a scene or a speech 
to round it off — probably a concession to stage tradition analogous to 
the similar use of ' gnomae ' in Greek plays, and of a ' sentiment ' 
in modern melodrama. 

In the present play, the general characteristics of the metre appear 
to be those of Shakespeare's middle period; but there are an unusual 
number of irregularities; the intense excitement constantly finds vent 
in rapid dialogue which overflows the bounds of metre. 

The extensive use of prose in the play is worth careful notice. 
Prose was at first used by Shakespeare for comic passages only, and 
even when this limitation ceased to be observed, it continued as a 
rule to be the medium of a lower plane of emotion than that repre- 
sented by blank verse. Thus in the present play it is appropriate to 
the discourse between Hamlet and the players (ii. 2 and iii. 2), be- 
tween Hamlet and the clowns (v. i), between Hamlet and Osric 
(v. 2). It is also, of course, used for letters (ii. 2; iv. 7), and the 
speech of servants. But it is also used exceptionally in the middle 
and later plays to produce special and peculiar effects, e.g. for the 
sleep-walking scene (v. i) in Macbeth, and for Ophelia's madness 
(iv. 5). Similarly, I think, Hamlet speaks in prose wherever he is 
playing the madman ; where he is not so acting, in the soliloquies, 
in the scenes with Horatio (iii. 2; v. 2), in the interview with his 
mother (iii. 4), in the lament over Ophelia (v. i), then in blank verse. 

1 This outline of Shakespeare's Prosody is adapted, by the kind permission ot 
Mr. A. D. Innes, from the one written by him for his edition of Jjilius Ccesar, in 
this series. 



202 HAMLET. 

In the scene with OpheUa (iii. i) he passes from blank verse to prose 
just at the point where he begins to suspect her good faith. Of 
course while Hamlet speaks prose, personages of less dignity must 
do the same ; the King, however, is not so bound (iv. 3). 

The 'plays within the play' (ii. 2; iii. 2) are written in a stilted 
and archaic style of blank verse, in order to produce an artificial 
effect in comparison with the ordinary dialogue, as that itself is arti- 
ficial when compared with the natural speech of ordinary life. (Cf. 
notes ad locc. ) 

Rhymed decasyllabic couplets are used to close a scene or a 
speech; and Hamlet occasionally breaks into doggerel rhyme in 
moments of excitement. 

§ 2. Form of Blank Verse. 

Our study of versification is commonly restricted to that of Latin and 
Greek. When we examine English verse-structure, a distinction at 
once appears. In the classical verse the governing element is quan- 
tity; in English it is stress. And inasmuch as stress is much less 
definite than quantity, the rules of English verse cannot be given 
with the same precision as those of Latin and Greek. But we may 
begin with certain explanations as to what stress is not. A ' stressed ' 
syllable is not the same as a long syllable; nor is stress the same as 
jigwi-^-emphasis. Any strong or prolonged dwelling of the voice on 
a syllable, for whatever reason, is stress. So, while a syllable must 
be either long or short, there are many shades of gradation between 
the unstressed and the strongly stressed. And as in Greek tragic 
verse a long syllable may, in certain positions, take the place of a short 
one, so a moderately stressed syllable may often in English take the 
place of an unstressed one. 

To start with, then, — to get at the basis of our metre — we will take 
no account of weak stress, but treat of all syllables as if they must 
either have no stress or a strong stress; and throughout, the word 
stress, when used without a qualifying adjective, will mean strong 
stress. The acute accent (') will be used to mark a stress, the grave 
(^) to mark a weak stress, the " to mark a syllable sounded but not 
stressed. 

The primary form of the Shakespearian line is — five feet, each of two 
syllables; each foot carrying one stress, on the second syllable; with 
a sense pause at the end of the line, and generally a slight pause, 
marked by a comma perhaps, after the 2nd or 3rd foot. This is 
called a caesura. 

But look' I the morn', | in rus' | set man' \ tie clad' (i. i. 166). 

§ 3. Normal Variations. 

But if there were no variations on this, the effect would be mono- 
tonous and mechanical after a very few lines. 

(i) The first variation therefore is brought about by the stress in 



ESSAY ON METRE. 203 

one or two of the feet being thrown on the first instead of the second 
syllable, which is known as an ' inverted ' stress. 

ist foot. Cost'ly I thy ha' | bit as' | thy purse' | can buy' (i. 3. 70). 

2nd foot. The wind' | sits' in | the shoul' I der of | your sail' (i. 3. 56). 

3rd foot. But this' I most foul' | strange' and | unna' | tural (i. 5. 28). 

4th foot. Why thy' | canon' | ized bones', | he'arsed | in death' (i. 4. 47). 

5th foot. Aifec' I tion ! pooh' ! | you speak' | like' a | green' girl (i. 3. loi). 

The stress is thus thrown back much more commonly in the first foot 
of the line than elsewhere : and in the other cases the stressed 
syllable usually follows a pause. 

(ii) Secondly, variety is introduced by the insertion of an extra 
unstressed syllable which is not extra-metrical, analogous to the use 
of an anapaest instead of an iambus. 

ist foot. T am more' | an an' | tique Ro' | man than' | a Dane[ (v. 2. 352). 

3rd foot. Of im' I pious stub' | bornness ; 't is' | unman' | ly grief (i. 2. 94). 

3rd foot. Let' it I be te' | nable in' | your si' | lence still' (i. 2. 248). 

4th foot. The light' | and care' | less li' | very that' | it wears' (iv. 7. 80). 

5th foot. How wear' | y, stale', | flat' and | unpro' | f itable (i. 2. 133). 

As a general rule, however, such extra syllables are very slightly 
pronounced; not altogether omitted but slurred, as very often happens 
when two vowels come next each other, or are separated only by a 
liquid (see § 6). 

(iii) The converse of this is the (very rare) omission of an unstressed 
syllable. This is only found where the stress is very strong, or when 
the omission is really made up for by a pause. 

For'ward, | not per' | manent', I — swe'et, ] not la'st(ing) (i. 3. 8). 

(iv) Extra-metrical unstressed syllables are added after a pause, 
sometimes after the second foot, rarely after the third. 

2nd foot. Till' the | last trum'(pet) : | for char' | ita' | ble prayers (v. i. 252). 
3rd foot. That can' i denote' | me tru'(ly) : | these' in | deed' seem (1. 2. 83). 

More frequently an extra-metrical syllable comes at the end of a 
line, and this is common in this play. It is only in quite early plays 
that it is at all unusual, only in the later ones that it is the normal 
rhythm, 

Whe'ther | 't is no' | bier in' | the mind' | to suf (fer) 

The slings' ! and ar' | rows' of | outra' | geous for'(tune) 

Or' to I take arms' | against' | a sea' | of trou'(bles) (iii. i. 57-9). 

The increasing frequency of extra-metrical syllables is a useful 
approximate guide to the date of a play. But they are never so 
frequent in Shakespeare as in some of the younger dramatists. 

(v) The variation which perhaps most of all characterizes the later 
plays is the disappearance of the sense-pause at the end of the line. 
At first, a clause running over from one line to the next is very rare: 
in the last plays, it is extremely common. (The presence of a sense- 
pause is not necessarily marked by a stop; it is sufficient for the 
purpose that the last word should be dwelt on ; the pause may be 



204 HAMLET. 

merely rhetorical, not grammatical. ) The proportion of overflow to 
end-stopped lines in Hamlet is considerable. 

§4. Weak Stresses. 

The basis of scansion being thus settled, we may observe how the 
rules are modified by weak or intermediate stresses, which are in fact 
the chief protection against monotony. 

(i) Lines in which there are not five strong stresses are very plenti- 
ful; e.g. 

Absent' | thee from' | feli' i city' | awhile' (v. 2. 358). 

In the fifth foot particularly, the stress is often extremely slight ; 
such 'light' or 'weak' endings are particularly characteristic of the 
later plays. 

(ii) On the other hand, lines in which there are two stressed 
syllables in one foot are common. 

His ca' I non gainst' | self-slaugh' | ter ! O' \ God' ! God' I (i. 2. 132). 

A foot with a double stress is nearly always preceded by a pause, 
or by a foot with a very weak stress only. 

(iii) It will be observed that there are never fewer than three 
strong stresses, and that any foot in which there is no strong stress 
must at any rate have one syllable with a weak stress, and that very 
often such a foot has two weak stresses; preventing the feeling that 
the line is altogether too light. Thus a syllable which is quite un- 
emphatic acquires a certain stress merely by length, as in some of the 
above cases. And, speaking broadly, a very strong stress in one foot 
compensates for a weak stress in the neighbouring foot. 

§ 5. Irregularities. 

(i) Occasionally lines occur with an extra foot; i.e. an additional 
stress after the normal ten syllables. 

A wor I thy pi | oner. | Once more | remove [ good friends (i. 5. 162). 
Had he | been van | quisher: | as by | the same co' | venant (i. i. 93). 

And sometimes there is even an extra syllable added (§ 3 (iv)). 
'Tis sweet i and com | menda | ble in | your na | ture Ham(let) (i. 2. 87). 

But perhaps this should be scanned — 

'Tis sweet | and com | mend'bl' in | your na | ture Ham(let). 

Cf. § 6. 

But this does not often occur in the course of a speech, and when 
it does there is usually a break in the middle of the line. It is, how- 
ever, decidedly common in broken dialogue. 

Ham. 'Go on ; | I'll fol I low thee | 

Mar. You shall 1 not go, | my lord (i. 4. 79). 

And this is probably often to be explained by the second speaker 
breaking in on the first, so that one or two syllables are pronounced 
simultaneously. 



ESSAY ON METRE. 



205 



(ii) Short incomplete lines of various lengths are also found, 
especially in broken, hurried, or excited dialogue, and at the be- 
ginning or end of a speech. They are especially common in this 
play. Sometimes the gap may be filled up by appropriate action, or 
a dramatic pause. 

(iii) Interjections and proper names (especially vocatives), even 
short questions or commands, are frequently extra-metrical. 

And shall | I cou | pie hell? | (O, fie !) | Hold, hold, | my heart (i. 5. 93). 

In nearly every instance observe that an unusual stress or an 
irregularity conies either after a pause, whether at the beginning of 
a line or in the middle; or at the end of a line in which there is a 
break. 

§ 6. Apparent Irregularities. 

(i) Difficulties occasionally arise from the fact that words in 
Shakespeare's day were sometimes accented in a different way from 
that of the present day, and sometimes even bear a different accent 
in different places in Shakespeare's own writing. Thus, we say 
'por'tent', Shakespeare always 'portent". On the other hand, we 
say 'complete", Shakespeare has sometimes 'complete" sometimes 
'com'plete' (i. 4. 52). In effect we must often be guided by the 
verse in deciding on which syllable of a word the accent should fall, 
because custom had not yet finally decided in favour of a particular 
syllable. Speaking broadly, the tendency of the modern pronuncia- 
tion is to throw the accent far back. 

(ii) Similarly, when two vowels come together (as in words end- 
ing with -ion, -ius, -ious, and the like) we are in the habit of slurring 
the first, and sometimes of blending it with the preceding consonant; 
so that we pronounce 'ambit-i-on' 'ambishon'. In Shakespeare the 
vowel in such cases is sometimes slurred and sometimes not, in the 
same word in different places; usually the former in the middle of a 
line, often the latter at the end. In such cases we must be guided 
simply by ear in deciding whether the vowel is slurred or sounded 
distinctly. And we have to decide in exactly the same way when we 
are to sound or not sound the terminal -ed of the past participle. 

So, too, ^praye7'^ is sometimes a monosyllable, sometimes a dis- 
syllable. 

And what 's | in pray | er but | this two- | fold force, 
To be forestalled ere we come to fall, 
Or pardon'd being down ? Then I '11 look up ; ^-^ 
My fault I is past. | But, O, | what form | oi prayer 
Can serve my turn? (iii. 3. 48). 

(iii) So again in particular words, a vowel seems to be sometimes 
mute, sometimes sounded. Thus we have memVy (i. 5. 96) and 
memory (i. 5. 98); or again, unnafral (i. 4. 25) and unnatural 
(i. 4. 28). 

(iv) In a large number of words where a liquid (/, m, n, and 
especially r) comes next to another consonant an indefinite vowel 



2o6 HAMLET. 

sound is sometimes introduced between the two letters (just as now 
in many places one may hear the word 'helm' pronounced 'helium'), 
which may be treated as forming a syllable, and sometimes the vowel 
is actually inserted, as in tAorou£-k = ' through'. 
A somewhat exceptional instance is 

Lends the 1 tongue vows: | these bla | zes daug- \ heter (i. 3. 117). 

(v) Conversely, a light vowel sound coming next a liquid is often 
sounded lightly and in effect dropped; so that such words as spirit 
(i. I, 138), peril, quarrel, are practically monosyllables. (Hence 
such a form as '' parlous'' — '' perilous'. Cf. i. 3. 102.) 

Ham. Perchance | 't will walk | again | 

Hot. I I warrant (Q2 warn^t) \ it will (i. 2. 244). 

(vi) th and v between two vowels are often almost or entirely 
dropped and the two syllables run into one: as in the words 'whether', 
'whither', 'other', 'either', 'ever', 'never', 'even', 'over'. 'Heaven' 
generally, 'evil', 'devil' sometimes, are treated as monosyllables, 
Q 2 prints deale in ii. 2. 628. 

Vowels separated by a zy or an h are habitually slurred and pro- 
nounced practically as one syllable. 

(vii) ' Fire ' and similar words which in common pronunciation 
are dissyllables ('fi-er', &c.) are commonly but not always scanned 
as monosyllables. 

(viii) Other ordinary contractions, such as 'we'll' for 'we will', th' 
for the before a vowel, &c., though not shown in the spelling, are 
frequent. 

§ 7. General Hints. 

(i) Often there are many possible ways of scanning a particular 
line, and the one adopted must depend on the individual taste of the 
reader. Thus he can frequently choose between § 3 (ii) and § 6. 
(ii) Irregularities are most common, 

{a) In passages of emotional excitement. 

{b) Before or after pauses. 

{c) Where proper names are introduced. 



GLOSSARY. 



a-, a degenerate preposition ; (i) 
a-making (i. 3. 19), a-gaming 
(ii. I. 58), for 'at'; cf. 'at gaming' 
(iii. 3. 91); (2) John- a- dreams 
(ii. 2. 596), for 'of; cf. Richard 
II. i. 3. 76, 'John a Gaunt'. 

absolute: (i) (v. i. 148), pre- 
cise; (2) (v. 2. Ill), Osrician for 
'faultless'. 

abuse (iv. 7. 51), deception. 

addition (i. 4. 20; ii. i. 47), that 
which is added to a man to dis- 
tinguish him, name, title; and so, 
reputation; cf. Merry Wives, ii. 
2. 312, "devils' additions, the 
names of fiends". 

admiration (i. 2. 192; iii. 2. 
339, 342), astonishment. 

aery (ii. 2. 354), an eagle's nest 
or brood; from the Low Latin 
area. 

affront (iii. i. 31), come face to 
face with. 

alarm (iii. 4. 120), sudden attack; 
from the Italian cry alV arme, to 
arms! 

amiss (iv. 5. 18), mischief. 

an: (i) (i. 5. 19; iii. 4. 122), a 
form of ' on ' , in the phrase ' an 
end' ; (2) (i. 5. 177; iv. 6. 8 ; v. 2. 
184), and, in the special sense of 
'if. The form an was rarely 
used in Shakespeare's time. Ex- 
cept in a7i 't, it only occurs once in 
F I ; but modern editors have ap- 
propriated it to the conditional 
sense of the word. And or an is 
often strengthened, as in i. 5. 177, 
by the addition of if. 

anchor (iii. 2. 229), anchorite, 
hermit. 

anon (ii. 2. 490), immediately; 
from the A,S. on dn, lit. 'in one' 
(moment). 



antic: (i) (v. 2. 352), ancient; 
(2) (i. 5. 172), fantastic. Probably 
the second sense is derived from 
the first, but Murray connects it 
with the Ital. antico, a cavern 
adorned with grotesques. 

appointment (iv. 6. 16), equip- 
ment. 

approve (i. i. 29), justify. 

argal (v. i. 13), a clownish cor- 
ruption of the Latin ergo, there- 
fore. 

argument (ii. 2. 372; iii. 2. 149, 
242; iv. 4. 54), subject, especially 
the subject of a drama. 

arrant (i. 5. 124; iii. i. 131), 
scoundrelly, lit. cowardly; from 
M.E. arghen, A.S. eargian, to be 
cowardly. 

arras (ii. 2. 162 ; iv. i. 9), 
tapestry, so called from Arras in 
Artois in the north of France. 

arrest (ii. 2. by, v. 2. 343), 
legal restraint. 

article (i. i. 94), clause in an 
agreement, 

assay: (i) (ii. i. 65), test; (2) 
(ii. 2. 71), attempt. 

assume (iii. 4. 160), acquire, 

at : (i) (iv. 3. 46), used by Shake- 
speare for the earlier a, a con- 
traction of the A.S, on ; (2) (iv. 3. 
56), near. 

avouch (i. I. 57), acknowledg- 
ment, 

audit (iii. 3. 82), final account. 

bar (i. 2. 14), exclude. 

batten (iii. 4. Sj), grow fat: 
cf. Coriolanus, iv. 5. 35, "batten 
on cold bits", and Milton, Ly- 
cidas, i. 29, "Battening our flocks 
with the fresh dews of night". 



208 



HAMLET. 



be, a form of by, used as a pre- 
fix, intensifies and modifies, in 
various ways, often very slight, 
the sense of the word it is attached 
to. Often it simply serves to form 
a verb, as in berattle (ii. 2. 357), 
belabour; beshrew (ii. i. 113), 
curse; beteem (i. 2. 141), allow; 
bespeak (ii. 2. 140), speak to, 
address. 

bear (i. 3. 67; iv. 3. 7), carry 
on, administer: cf. Ccesar, ii. i. 
226, 'bear it as our Roman actors 
do'. 

beaver (i. 2. 229), the movable 
part of the helmet covering the 
face, the visor. 

bedded (iii. 4. 121), laid flat. 

beetle (i. 4. 71), hang over. 

bent (ii. 2. 30), inclination; so 
at bent (iv. 3. 47), inclined. 

bias(ii. i. 65), inclination to one 
side ; from Low Latin bifax, ' one 
who looks askew': (i) of a bowl, 
(2) any preventing tendency. Cf. 
John, ii. I. 574, "commodity, the 
bias of the world ". 

bilboes (v. 2. 6), iron fetters; 
from Bilboa, correctly Bilbao, a 
place of steel manufacture in Spain. 

bisson (ii. 2. 529), blind, blind- 
ing: probably from A. S. bi-, near, 
and sion, to see; cf. Coriolanus 
(ii. I. 70), "your bisson conspec- 
tuities". 

blank (iv. i. 42), the white mark 
in the centre of a target. 

blazon (i. 5. 21), proclamation. 

blench (ii. 2. 626), start. 

bodykins (ii. 2. 554), diminu- 
tive of body, used in the oath, 
'God's bodikins". 

bore (iv. 6. 26), importance ; 
lit. the calibre, or size of shot. 

bourne (iii. i. 79), boundary. 

brainish (iv. i. n), brainsick. 

brave (ii. 2. 611), befitting, used 
ironically. 
bravery (v. 2. 79), ostentation. 



bruit (i. 2. 127), announce 
noisily. Cf. Macbeth, v. 7. 22, ' ' By 
this great clatter one of greatest 
note I Seems bruited". 

bug (v. 2. 22), bugbear, bogy. 

button (i. 3. 40), bud. 

can (iv. 7. 85), are able, can do. 

canker: (i) (i. 3. 39), a worm 
that destroys blossoms ; (2) meta- 
phorically (v. 2. 69), destructive 
element. 

capable; (i) (iii. 2. 13), able to 
receive; (2) (iii. 4. 127V suscept- 
ible. 

cap a pe (i. 2. 200), from head 
to foot ; Old Fr. de cap a pie. Cf. 
Winter s Tale, iv. 4. 771, "I am 
courtier cap a pe". 

card (v. I. 149; V. 2. 114), 
either a 'chart', or the face of a 
compass, or a card with rules for 
etiquette, or a player's 'part' or 
' plat ' : see notes ad locc. 

carriage (i. i. 74), Osrician for 
the ' hanger ' of a sword. 

cast, noun (iii. i. 85), surface 
colouring; cf. 'roughcast,' the 
plaster surface of a wall. 

cast, vb. (ii. i. 115), seek for a 
lost scent — a hunting metaphor. 

cataplasm (iv. 7. 144), plaster. 

cautel (i. 3. 15), deceit. 

cease (iii. 3. 15), death. 

censure (i. 3. 69; i. 4. 35; iii. 
2. 82), opinion. 

cerement (i. 4. 48), a shroud of 
waxed linen ; ■ from the Lat. cera, 
wax. 

choler (iii. 2. 315), anger, liter- 
ally ' bile'. 

chopine (ii. 2. 447), a high- 
heeled shoe used by women in 
Italy. 

chough : (i ) generally a crow or 
jackdaw; (2) (v. 2. 89), here only, 
a clown, spelt chuff in i Henry IV. 
ii. 2. 94. Cf. Cotgrave's Diction- 
ary, s.v. Maschefouyn, "A chuffe. 



GLOSSARY. 



209 



boor, lobcocke, lozell ; one that is 
fitter to feed with cattell, than to 
conuerse with men". 

circumstance (i. 5. 127; iii. i. 
I ; iii. 3. 83), a roundabout course. 

clepe(i. 4. 19), call, name. A.S. 
cleopian. The word, so common 
in Chaucer, is rare in Elizabethan 
English. Cf. Macbeth, iii. i. 93 ; 
Love's Labour's Lost, v, i. 24; 
Venus and Adonis, 995. 

climature (i. i. 125), country. 
Climate is similarly used in Ccesar, 
i. 3. 32, "They are portentous 
things I Unto the climate that they 
point upon". 

coil (iii. I. 67), either that which 
is wrapped round, like a coil of 
rope, a covering ; or turmoil, 
bustle ; cf. Much Ado, v. 2. 98, 
" Yonder 's old coil at home", 

collateral (iv. 5. 206), indirect. 

compass (iii. 2. 384), the extent 
of a voice, the notes which it can 
take. 

competent (i. i. 90), equivalent. 

complexion (i. 4. 27; v. 2. 102), 
temperament, disposition. 

comply (ii. 2. 39; v. 2. 195), be 
courteous: in the usual sense of 
complimetit. 

compost (iii. 4. 151), manure. 

conceit : (i) (ii. 2. 579, 583 ; iii. 
4. 114), imagination; often in the 
sense of (2) (iv. 5. 145 ; v. 2. 160) 
fantastic imagination. 

confine (i. i. 155; ii. 2. 252), 
prison. 

congrue (iv. 3. 66), agree, be 
suitable . 

conjunctive (iv. 7. 14), closely 
united. 

conscience . (i) (iv. 7. i), the 
moral consciousness ; (2) (v. 2. 67), 
morality; (3) (iii. i. 83), conscious- 
ness generally, especially self- 
consciousness, speculation. 

consonancy (ii. 2, 295), agree- 
ment. 

(885) 



continent, that which contains : 
j (i)(iv. 4. 64), literally, 'cover'; (2) 
(v. 2. 115), metaphorically, ' in- 
I ventory'. 

contraction (iii. 4. 46), mar- 
riage contract. 

conversation (iii. 2. 60), inter- 
course; the sense of the Latin 
conversari. 

cope (iii. 2. 60), encounter. 

cote (ii. 2. 329), pass by, out- 
strip ; a technical term in coursing. 
Cf Drayton, Polyolbion, xxiii. 
1115— 

"Each man notes 
Which dog first turns the hare, 

which first the other cotes" ; 
and Turberville, ' ' In coursing at 
a deer, if one greyhound go end- 
ways by another, it is accounted a 
cote". From the French c^^'£)_y^r, 
to coast along. 

counter (iv. 5. no), in the 
wrong direction ; another technical 
term of venery, used when a dog 
follows the scent backwards; cf. 
2 Henry IV. i. 2. 102, and Comedy 
of Errors, iv. 2. 239, ' ' a hound 
that runs counter, and yet draws 
dry-foot well". From the Latin 
contra, opposite to. 

cozen (iii. 4. 78), cozenage (v. 

2. 67), trick, trickery; lit. 'call 
cousin', and so 'sponge upon', 
' beguile ' ; the French cousiner. 

crants (v. i. 255), a garland, in 
the especial sense of a maiden's 
funeral garland, the German 
kranz. The word is connected 
with the Latin corona, crown ; cf 
stage-direction to Chapman's ^Z- 
phonsus, "Enter Saxon Mentz, 
like Clowns with each of them a 
Mitre with Corances on their 
heads". 

cry (iii. 2. 289), company; lit. 
the noise of hounds, and so, a 
pack of hounds ; cf. Midsummer 
Night's Dream, "a cry more tune- 
able | Was never holla'd to", and 
Coriolanus, iii. 3. no, "you com- 
mon cry of curs". 

O 



2IO 



HAMLET. 



cue (ii. 2. 60), hint, motive ; lit. 
in stage terminology, the catch- 
word by which an actor knows his 
turn to speak; cf. Henry V. iii. 
6. 130, ' ' now we speak upon our 
cue". 

curb (iii. 4. 155), bow, bend; 
the French courber. 

dear (i. 2. 182) is used of any- 
thing that touches deeply, even if 
it yields pain rather than pleasure ; 
cf. Richard II. i. 3. 151, "my 
dear exile"; King John, i. i. 257, 
"my dear offence"; Macbeth, v, 
2. 3, " their dear causes ". 

defeat (ii. 2. 598), destruction. 

delate (i. 2. 38), convey, in- 
tnist ; Bacon appears to use the 
word in this sense, but it generally 
means ' accuse '. 

design (i. i. 94), point out, 
mention, designate. 

die (i. 3. 128), colour, character. 

dild (iv. 5. 41), in the phrase 
'God dild you', probably a cor- 
ruption of 'God yield you', pos- 
sibly of 'God shield you'. This 
form occurs in Sir John Oldcastle 
(1600), but 'God 'ild you' is more 
usual ; cf. e.g. Macbeth, i. 6. 13. 

disclose, noun (iii. i. 174); vb. 
(v. I. 310), hatch. 

document (iv. 5. 178), lesson, 
object - lesson ; from the Latin 
docere, teach. 

dole (i. 2. 13), grief; from the 
Latin dolere, grieve. 

dout (iv. 7. 192), extinguish; a 
contraction of do out, just as don 
is of do on ; cf i. 4. 37, note. 

down-gyved (ii. i. 80), of 
stockings, pulled down over the 
ankles like gyves or fetters. Cf. 
gyves. 

drossy (v. 2. 197), pinchbeck, 
imitative. The dross is the refuse 
of an ore from which the pure 
metal has been extracted. 

ducat (iii. 4. 24), a gold coin, 



the Italian ducato, from ducatus 
(Duchy of Apulia) in the legend 
upon it. 

eager: (i) (i. 5. 69), acid, sour; 
(2) (i. 4. 2), keen, biting; from the 
O. F, egre (French aigre), Latin 
acer, sharp. 

ecstasy (ii. i. 102; iii. i. 168; 
iii. 4. 74, 138, 139), excitement, 
madness ; any state of being be- 
side oneself; from Gr. \k = out, 
(rT«<7;?= standing. 

edge (iii. I. 26), keenness, desire. 

effects (iii. 4. 129), actions ; cf 
Macbeth, v. i. 12, ' ' do the effects 
of watching". 

eisel (v. I. 299), either the cor- 
ruption of the name of a river, as 
the Yssel or Weissel ; or vinegar. 
Cf. So?i7iet cxi. , "I will drink 
potions of eisel 'gainst my strong 
infection"; cf. Chaucer, Romaufit 
of the Rose, 217, "Breed | Kneden 
with eisel strong and egre"; and 
the eighth prayer in the Salisbury 
Primer, 1555, ' O blessed Jesu ! . . . 
I beseech thee for the bitterness 
of the aysell and gaul that thou 
tasted". 

emulate (i. i. 83), emulous, 
jealous. 

enacture (iii. 2. 207), action. 

encounter (ii. 2. 164; v. 2. 199), 
meeting, behaviour, dialogue. 

entertainment: (i) (ii. 2. 329), 
reception, treatment ; (2) (i. 3. 64 ; 
ii. 2. 392; V. 2. 216), in the special 
sense of kindly treatment, cour- 
tesy. 

envious (iv. 7. 174) ; enviously 
(iv. 5. 6), spiteful, spitefully, petu- 
lantly. 

escot (ii. 2. 362), paid, main- 
tained ; from O, F. escotter ; A. S. 
j-^c/r: payment, money shot into a 
common fund, scdotan— to shoot. 

eterne (ii. 2. 512), eternal. Cf. 
Macbeth, iii. 2. 38, ' ' But in them 
nature's copy 's not eterne". 



GLOSSARY. 



211 



exception (v. 2. 242), dislike; 
as in the phrase, ' to take excep- 
tion'. 

excrement (iii. 4. 121), hair. 
Cf. Comedy of Errors, ii. 2. 79, 
' ' Why is Time so niggard of hair, 
being as it is so plentiful an excre- 
ment?" 

expostulate (ii. 2. 86), converse, 
expound. 

express (ii. 2. 317), expressive, 
significant. 

extent (ii. 2. 390), behaviour. 
Cf. Twelfth Night, iv. i. 57, " In 
this uncivil and unjust extent | 
Against thy peace". 

eyas (ii. 2. 355), nestling ; a term 
of falconry for a young hawk just 
taken from the nest, French 



fantasy (i. i. 23; iv. 4. 61), 
imagination, caprice. 

fardel (iii, i. 76), bundle, bur- 
den; said to be from the Arabic 
fardah, through the Yx&a.Qh.farde. 

fay (ii. 2. 271), faith. 

fee: (i) (iv. 4. 22), land held as 
private property ; (2) (i. 4. 65 ; ii. 
2. 73), payment, value; from A.S. 
feoh, cattle, property, connected 
with 'L.dXvsx pecus, fecunia. 

fell (v. 2. 61), cruel. 

felly (ii. 2. 517), the rim of a 
wheel. 

fetch (ii. I. 38), stratagem. Cf, 
Lear, ii, 4. 89 — 

"Deny to speak with me? They 
are sick? they are weary? 
They have travell'd all the night ? 
Mere fetches". 

figure (i. I. 41, 109; i, 2. 199; 
iii. 4. 104), form, shape. 

flaw (v. I. 239), a gust of wind. 
Cf, 2 Henry IV. iv, 4. 35 — 

"As humorous as winter and as 
sudden 
As flaws congealed in the spring 
of day". 



flushing (i. 2, 155), either a 
rush of water or a redness. 

foil (v. 2. 265, 266, &c.): (i) a 
blunted rapier, from 'foil', defeat; 
(2) the gold-leaf used to set off a 
jewel; from ha-tin fo/tzim, 'leaf. 
Hence whatever serves to set off 
anything else by contrast. 

fond (i. 5. 99; V. 2. 200), foolish. 

fordo (ii. I. T03 ; V. I. 244), de- 
stroy. 

forgery (iv. 7. 89), invention, 
imagination. 

fret: (i) (iii. 2. 388), vex, chafe, 
with an allusion to the fret or stop 
in a rnusical instrument ; from 
A. S.fretan, short for for-etan {for, 
'entirely'; etan, 'eat'), 'to eat 
away', .'wear away', Cf, Lear, 
i. 4. 307, "fret channels in her 
cheeks" : (2) (ii. 2. 313), ornament; 
from A, S. frcBtwian. Cf. Cyni- 
belijie, ii. 4. 88, ' ' The roof of the 
chamber | With golden cherubins 
is fretted", 

function (ii. 2. 582), bodily 
activity. 

fust (iv, 4. 39), grow mouldy ; 
lit, ' taste of the cask ' , from O, F. 
fuste, a stick, a cask ; Latin 
fustis, a stick. 

gain -giving (v. 2. 226), mis- 
giving, the sense of 'gain' being 
adverse, as in 'gainsay'. 

gentry (ii, 2. 22 ; v. 2. 114), 
courtesy. 

gib (iii. 4. 190), a tom-cat ; cf, 
I Henry IV. i, 2. 83, "As melan- 
choly as a gib-cat". 

goblin (i. 4. 40; v. 2. 22), a 
mischievous spirit, from L. L. 
gobelinus, dimin. of cohalus — 
demon, 

gorge (v, I. 207), stomach. 

grained (iii. 4, 90), ingrained, 
dyed in grain, i.e. of a fast colour, 
M. E. engreynen, coined from F. 
en (Lat. in), and O. F. graine, 
' ' the seed of herbs, also grain, 
wherewith cloth is died in grain. 



212 



KAMLET. 



scarlet die, scarlet ingraine", Cot- 
grave. From L. granum. 

green (i. 3. loi), greenly (iv. 
5. 83), foolish, foolishly. 

gules (ii. 2. 479), red, an her- 
aldic term. Cf, Timon, iv. 3. 59, 
"With man's blood paint the 
ground, gules, gules"; probably 
from the open mouth of the her- 
aldic lion, Lat. gula — ihxo'BX. 

gjTves (iv. 7. 21), fetters; a Cel- 
tic w^ord. Cf. Irish gabh — take; 
con. M^ith Lat. capere—\.o take. 

harbinger (i. i. 122), fore- 
runner ; M. E. herbergeour, O. F. 
herberg-er, one who provided 
lodgings for a man of rank. 

hatchment (iv. 5. 213), a coat 
of arms hung up as a sign of the 
death of the owner. 

haunt (iv. i. 18), publicity. Cf. 
Antony and Cleopatra, iv. 14. 54 — 
" Dido and her vEneas shall want 
troops. 

And all the haunt be ours". 

hautboy (iii. 2. 145, stage-dir. ), 
a wooden wind-instrument resem- 
bling the modern oboe. 

havoc (v. 2. 375), slaughter; 
said to be from A. S. hafoc, hawk, 
so that ' Cry havoc ! ' is literally 
' Cry ware hawk ! ' 

head (iv. 5. loi), armed force. 

hectic (iv. 3. 68), fever. 

hent (iii. 3. 88), grip ; or per- 
haps 'way', 'course'. The word 
is used in western counties for the 
course of a ploughshare. 

heyday (iii. 4. 69), wildness, 
wantonness. 

honesty: (i) (ii. 2. 204), becom- 
ing, befitting; (2) (iii. i. 108), 
chastity. 

hoodman blind (iii. 4. 78), 
blindman's buff, 

hugger-mugger (iv. 5. 84), se- 
crecy. 

humour (ii. 2. 12), disposition. 
The four chief types of disposition. 



the sanguine, choleric, phlegmatic, 
melancholic, were supposed to de- 
pend on the preponderance of 
various humours in the blood. 

husbandry (i. 3. tj), thrift. Cf. 
Macbeth, ii. i. 4, "There's hus- 
bandry in heaven, their candles 
are all out". 

impartment (i. 4. 59), com- 
munication. 

impasted (ii. 2. 481), made into 
paste, clotted. 

imperious (v. i. 236), imperial 

implorator (i. 3. 129), one who 

implores or solicits. 
impone (v. 2. 155, 171), lay 

upon ; Osrician for ' wager '. 

import: (i) (i. 2. 23), purport; 
(2) (iv. 3. 65; V. 2. 21), imply; (3) 
(iii. 2. 149, &c. ), signify. 

imposthume (iv. 4. 27), abscess. 

impress (i. i. 75), enforced ser- 
vice. Cf. modern ' press-gang '. 

incapable (iv. 7. 179), unable 
to understand. Cf. capable. 

incorporal (iii. 4. 116), im- 
material. 

indenture (v, i, 119), agree- 
ment, a legal term. Agreements 
made in duplicate were cut with 
indented edges to fit one another. 

index (iii. 4. 52), explanatory 
prologue. 

indifferent (ii. 2. 3), of mode- 
rate estate, neither high nor low. 

indue (iv. 7. 180), furnish. 

ingenious (v. i. 271), belonging 
to the intellect, wise, 

inhibition (ii. 2. 346), prohibi- 
tion; used technically for a prohibi- 
tion of theatrical performances by 
authority. 

inoculate (iii. i. 119), graft, 
bud. 

instance (iii. 2. 192), motive, 

instant, adj. (i. v. 71), imme- 
diate; adv. (i. V. 94), immediately. 

investment (i. 3. 128), dress. 



GLOSSARY. 



213 



jealousy (ii. i. 113; iv. 5. 19), 
suspicion. 

jowl (v. I. 84), thrust, throw. 

jump (i. I. 65; V. 2. 386), ex- 
actly. 

kibe (v. I. 153), a sore on the 
heel, chilblain, Cf. Lear, i. 5. 9, 
' ' If a man's brains were in 's heels, 
were 't not in danger of kibes ". 

kindless (ii. 2. 609), unnatural. 

lard (iv. 5. 37; V. 2. 20), enrich; 
lit. fatten. 

learn (v. 2. 9), teach, 

let: (i) (iv. 5. 54), allow; from 
A. S. laitan\ (2) (i. 4. 85), hinder; 
from A. S. lettan. 

liberal (iv. 7. 171), licentious, 
free-spoken. 

list, noun: (i) (i. 1.98; i. 2. 32), 
catalogue, number; (2) (iv. 5. 99), 
border, boundary. The idea com- 
mon to both meanings appears to 
be that of a strip. 

list, vb. : (i) (i. 5. 177), desire, 
conn, with lust ; (2) (i. 3. 30 ; 
i. 5. 22), listen. 

loggats (v. I. 100), a game, 
something like bowls, in which 
wooden logs are thrown at a 
'jack'; cf. Jonson, Tale of a Tub, 
iv. 6, ' ' Now are they tossing of 
his legs and arms | Like loggats 
at a pear tree". 

luxury (i. 5. 83), lust. 

mallecho (iii. 2. 147), mischief, 
the Span, malhecho. Cf. Shirley, 
Gentleman of Venice, ' ' Be humble, 
thou man of mallecho, or thou 
diest". 

marry (i. 4, 13, &c.), an ex- 
clamation denoting indignation, 
scorn, or vehement assertion; ori- 
ginally an invocation of the B. V, 
Mary, of whose name the word is 
a corrupt form. Cf. Richard II. 
i. 4. 16; iv, I. 114. 

mart (i. i. 74), traffic. 



mass (v. I. 62), the communion 
service in the Catholic church ; 
from the concluding words of the 
priest, Ite, missa est. 

matin (i. 5. 89), morning. 

mazzard (v. i. 97), head, skull; 
used again in Othello, ii. 3. 155. 

miching (iii. 2. 147), secret; lit. 
sneaking; cf. Florio, Ital. Diet., 
' ' Acciapinare : to miche, to shrug 
or sneak in some corner"; and 
Prompt. Parv. ' ' Mychyn, or stelyn 
pryuely". 

milch (ii. 2. 540), moist; not 
confined to milk ; cf. Drayton, 
Polyolbion,yi\\\. 171, "exhaling the 
milch dew". 

mineral (iv, i, 26), a mine or 
vein of metal; cf. Hall, Satires, 
bk, vi. — 
' ' Shall it not be a wild -fig in a wall. 

Or fired brimstone in a mineral?" 

mobled (ii. 2. 525), muffled, 
wearing a mob-cap or ' clout ' 
(line 529); cf. Shirley, Gentleman 
of Venice, ' ' The moon does mobble 
up herself". 

m'Oiety (i. i. 90), portion, lit. 
half. 

mole (i. 4. 24), blemish. 

mope (iii. 4. 81), be dull, with- 
out activity. 

mortal: (i) (iv. 4. 51; iv. 5. 60), 
subject to death; and so (2) (ii, 2, 
539; iii, I, 67), human; (3) (iv. 7. 
143), causing death. 

mortise (iii. 3. 20), fasten. A 
mortise is a hole in a piece of wood 
into which a projecting part of 
another piece is fitted. 

mountebank (iv. 7. 142), quack; 
the Ital, montambatico, lit. one 
who mounts a bench to proclaim 
his wares. 

mow (ii. 2. 301), grimace. 

muddy-mettled (ii. 2. 593), 
sluggish-natured. Mettle is 'sub- 
stance', 'temper': another form of 
metal; no distinction is made be- 
tween the two words in old editions, 
either in spelling or use. 



214 



HAMLET. 



mutine (v. 2. 6), mutineer, rebel. 

napkin (v. 2. 299), handkerchief. 

native (i. 2. 47), at home, in 
the place of one's birth. 

nerve (i. 4. 83), muscle, the 
' sinew ' of modern English, where- 
as the Elizabethan sinew often 
corresponds rather to oiir nerve. 

nonce (iv. 7. 16), always in the 
phrase for the nonce. This is 
the A. S. for then anes, where then 
isthedat. of the article, and anes— 
once. Thus ' for the once, for the 
occasion '. (Skeat. ) 

occurrents (v. 2. 368), occur- 
rences, events. 

o'erreach: (i) (iii. i. 17), over- 
take; (2) (v. I. 87), outwit, with a 
punning allusion to the literal 
sense. 

o'ersized (ii. 2. 284), smeared 
over. 

omen (i. i. 123), a fatal event 
foretold by a sign ; more usually 
the word means the sign itself, 
but not in Shakespeare. 

operant (iii. 2. 184), operative, 
active. 

ore (iv. I. 25), a mineral con- 
taining precious metal. 

orisons (iii. i. 89), prayers; 
from Fr. oraiso7i, Lat. oratio. 

ostentation (iv. 5. 209), display, 
pageant. 

paddock (iii. 4. 190), toad. Cf. 
Macbeth, i. i. 9. The word is also 
used in various parts of England 
for a frog. 

pajock (iii. 2. 295), probably 
peacock. Dyce states that in the 
north of Scotland a peacock is 
popularly called a ' peajock '. 
Skeat, however, would derive the 
word from patch, a motley fellow, 
a fool. Or it may be merely raga- 
muffin, tatterdemalion, the ' king 
of shreds and patches ' of iii. 4. 
102. Mr. Ingleby quotes fatchocke 



as applied by Spenser to a ragged 
Irishman. 

palmy (i. i. 113), glorious: the 
palm being an emblem of superi- 
ority; cf. V. 2. 40, and Timon, v. i. 
12, "You shall see him a palm 
in Athens again and flourish with 
the highest". 

paragon (ii. 2. 320), model, 
pattern; from Span, paj-a con, in 
comparison with. 

parle (i. i. 62), parley, confer- 
ence. From Fr. parler, speak, a 
military term. Cf. Richard II. 
i. I. 192; iii. 3. 33. 

partisan (i. i. 140), halberd, 
battle-axe; perhaps from the 
O.Yi.Qf. partd, axe. 

pass, noun (iv. 7. 139 ; v. 2. 61, 
173), thrust, bout, at fencing. So 
the vb. to pass (v. 2. 309). 

periwig-pated (iii. 2. 10). A 
periwig is false hair; the Fr. 
perruque, Ital. perucca ; conn, 
with Ital. piluccare, pull out hair. 
Lat. pilus, a hair. 

perpend (ii. 2. 105), consider. 

peruse (iv. 7. 137), examine 
closely. 

petard (iii. 4. 207), a case or 
shell filled with explosives. 

picked (v. I. 151), refined, 
dainty. 

pioner (i. 5. 163), military 
engineer. 

pitch (iii. I. 86), importance, 
lit. height: a metaphor from fal- 
conry, in which the word denoted 
the height to which a hawk soared 
before it swooped. Cf 2 Henry 
VI. ii. I. 5- 

" But what a point, my lord, your 
falcon made. 

And what a pitch she flew above 
the rest". 

plausive (i. 4. 30), plausible. 

plurisy (iv. 7. 118), properly 
pleurisy, an affection of the lungs, 
from the Gk. tcXiu^o.; but treated 
as if it meant a ' plethora ' or ful- 



GLOSSARY. 



215 



ness of blood, and spelt as if from 
Lat. plus, more. 

point (i. 2. 200), summit of per- 
fection, in the phrase at point, i.e. 
perfectly ready. Cf. Macbeth, iv. 

3- 135- 
porpentiiie(i. 5. 20), porcupme. 
posset (i. 5. 68), a hot thick 
drink, generally made of curdled 
milk; the phrase 'eat a posset' 
occurs in Merry Wives, v. 5. 180. 
Cf. also Macbeth, ii. 2. 6. 

posy (iii. 2. 162), motto on a 
ring, a corruption of poesy; cf. 
Merchant of Venice, v. i. 148 — 
' A ring . . . whose posy was 
For all the world like cutler's 

poetry 
Upon a knife". 
power (iv. 4. 9), armed force. 
practice (iv. 7. 66. 139), strata- 
gem. 

precurse (i. i. i2i),forerunmng, 
omen. 

pregnant (ii. 2. 212), ingenious, 
full of subtle meaning. 
present (iv. 3. 6^), immediate. 
pressure (i. 5. 100; iii. 2. 27), 
impression, character. 
prevent (ii. 2. 305), anticipate. 
primy (i. 5- 7). i" its prime, 
spring-Hke, youthful; cf. Sonnet 
iii. , "the lovely April of her 
prime". 

process: (i) (i. 5. 37". iii- 3- 29). 
proceeding, course of events; cf. 
Richard III. iv. 3. 32, "tell the 
process of their death"; (2) (iv. 3. 
65), order, decree. 

proof: (i)(iii. 2. 179; iv. 7. 113, 
1(55), trial; (2) (ii. 2. 512), strength. 
Cf. Macbeth, i. 2. 54— 
" Bellona's bridegroom, lapped in 

proof". 
So too the adj. (iii. 4. 38), and the 
participle unapproved (i. i. 96)- 

puffed (i. 3- 49; iv- 4- 49). in- 
flated. , 

pursy (iii. 4- i53). fat and 
breathless. 



push (v. I. 318), impulse, set- 
ting in motion. 

quality (ii. 2. 263), profession. 
quarry (v. 2. 375), a heap of 
dead game ; Fr. cur^e, the entrails 
given to the hounds ; a technical 
term of sport. Cf. Macbeth, iv. 
3. 206. 

question (ii. 2. 356), conversa- 
tion; cf. notes ad loc. and As You 
Like It, iii. 4. 39, "I met the duke 
yesterday, and had much question 
with him". 

quick, noun (ii. 2. 626 ; iv. 7. 
124), sensitive flesh, 

quick, adj. (v. i. 137, 274, 302), 
alive. 

quiddity (v. i. 107), subtlety; 
from Med. Lat. quidditas, the 
' whatness ' or nature of a thing, a 
scholastic term ; and so ' a subtle 
scholastic distinction '. 

quietus (iii. i. 7S)^ discharge; 
a lejal term for the acquittance 
given by the exchequer at the 
settlement of an account. Cf. 
Sonnet cxxvi. — 

"Her audit, though delayed, an- 
swered must be, 
A nd her quietus is to ren der thee " . 
quillet (v. I. 108), trick, esp. 
in argument ; from Lat. quidlibet, 
anything you will. 

quintessence (ii. 2. 321), an 
extract of a thing containing its 
chief qualities; so, the purest part 
of a thing; of. As You Like It, iii. 
2. 147— 
" The quintessence of every sprite 

Heaven would in little show ". 
From Lat. quinta essentia, fifth 
essence, the first four being the 
four elements. 

quit (v. 2. 68, 280), requite. 
quote (ii. i. 112), observe; cf. 
Troilus and Cressida, iv. 5. 233 — 
' ' I have with exact view perused 
thee. Hector, 
And quoted joint by joint ". 



2l6 



HAMLET. 



rack (ii. 2. 506), cloud. 

rank (iv. 4. 22), great, literally- 
luxuriant. Cf. iii. 4. 152. 

ravel (iii. 4. 186), loosen; woven 
or twisted things are said to ' ravel ' 
when the strands part ; cf. Richard 
II. iv. I. 288— 
' ' Must I ravel out | My weaved up 

folly?" 
and cf. Macbeth, ii. 2. 37 — 
' ' Sleep that knits up the ravell'd 
sleave of care ". 

razed (iii. 2. 288), streaked, 
slashed. Cf. Holme, Academy of 
Armory, bk. iii. ch. i. p. 14: 
' ' Pinked or raised shooes, have 
the over leather's grain part cut 
into roses, or other devices ". 

reck (i. 3. 51), care for, mind. 

recorder (iii. 2. 303, 360), a kind 
of small flute. Cf. Chappell, /^i^/a- 
lar Music of the Olden Time, p. 246. 

rede (i. 3. 51), counsel. 

reechy (iii. 4. 184), stinking, 
lit. smoky. 

regard : (i) (iv. 7. 76), estima- 
tion, opinion; (2) (iii. i. 87), con- 
sideration ; (3) (ii, 2. 79), in the 
phrase ' on such regards ', on such 
conditions. 

region, noun (ii. 2. 509), the 
sky, properly a division of the sky 
according to the science of the 
Roman augurs ; so too the adj. 
(ii. 2. 607); cf. Sonnet y^yiyim.., "The 
region cloud hath masked him from 
me now". 

replication (iv. 2, 13), reply. 

requiem (v. i. 260), a hymn 
sung for the dead; from the Lat. 
reqtiies, rest. 

respect (iii. i. 68; iii. 2. 193), 
consideration. 

retrograde (i. 2. 114), contrary, 
return (i. i. 91), fall to, without 
any idea of previous possession. 

rhapsody (iii. 4. 48), a collection 
of meaningless words. Cf. Florio's 
Montaigne, p. 68, ed. 1603, "This 



concerneth not those mingle- 
mangles of many kindes of stuffe, 
or, as the Grecians call them, rap- 
sodies ". The Gr. pa^/toSo? is pro- 
perly 'one who strings'" songs to- 
gether, a reciter of epic poetry". 

rival (i. i. 13), associate. Cf. 
the use of rivality in Antony and 
Cleopatra, iii, 5. 8, " Caesar having 
made use of him in the wars against 
Pompey, presently denied him 
rivahty ". 

robustious (iii. 2. 10), sturdy, 
Cf. Henry V. iii. 7. 159. 

romage (i. i. 107), bustle. 

rood (iii. 4. 14), cross, crucifix, 
the same word as ' rod '. 

round (iii. 1. 191; iii. 4. 5), plain- 
spoken. Cf. Othello, i. 3. 90, "A 
round unvarnished tale ". 

rouse (i. 2. 127; i. 4. 8; ii. i. 58), 
revel, noisy mirth: the German 
rausch, a flare up. See the pas- 
sage from Howell on ' the Danish 
rousa ' quoted in the note to i. 4. 8. 
The word has no connection with 
carouse. 

rub (iii. I. 65), obstacle, lit. 
roughness or inequality in the 
ground, especially on a bowling- 
green. Cf. Richard II. iii. 4. 4, 
" 'Twill make me think the world 
is full of rubs ". 

sallet (ii. 2. 462), spiciness, 
indecency. The same word as 
'salad'. 

sans (iii. 4. 79), without; a 
French word. 

saw (i. 5. 100), maxim. Cf. 
As You Like It, ii. 7. 156, " wise 
saws and modern instances ". 

scarf, vb. (v. 2. 13), fling on 
like a scarf. Cf. Macbeth, iii. 2. 
47, 'Sealing night | scarf up the 
tender eye of pitiful day ". 

scope (i. I. 68; i. 2. 37), extent, 
range of action. From the Greek 
ffxo'jri)?, 'mark to aim at'. 

scrimer (iv. 7. loi), fencer; the 
Fr. escriifieur. 



GLOSSARY. 



217 



season: (i) (i. 2. 192; ii, i. 28), 
qualify, by throwing in an ingre- 
dient; (2) (iii. 2. 219; iii. 3. 86), 
mature, ripen. 

seize (i. i. 89), a legal term, to 
take seisin or possession. 

sere (ii. 2. 337), the catch in the 
mechanism of a gun which pre- 
vents it from going off until it is 
released by the trigger. 

sergeant (v. 2. 347), bailiff. 

set (i. 3. 122; iv. 3. 64), value. 

shard (v. i. 254), fragment of 
pottery. 

shark (i. i. 98), gather together 
without selection, as a shark col- 
lects every kind of fish into its 
maw. 

shent (iii. 2. 416), reproached, 
put to shame. 

short (iv. I. 18), in the phrase 
keep short, restrain. So take up 
short in Henry V. ii. 4. 72. 

siege (iv. 7. 77), rank; cf. Othello, 
i. 2. 22, "men of royal siege". 

simple (iv. 7. 145), medicinal 
herb; orig. a single element in a 
compound medicine. Cf. As You 
Like It, iv. I. 16, "a melancholy 
of mine own, compounded of many 
simples". 

sith(iv. 4. 45), since; both forms 
are short for ' sithence '. 

slander (i. 3. 132), disgrace, 
waste, spoil. Cf. Much Ado, ii. 3. 
47, " Tax not so bad a voice | To 
slander music any m ore than once' ' . 

sledded (i. i. 63), either 'borne 
on sleds or sledges', or 'heavily 
weighted'. Cf. sledge-hammer. 

sliver (iv. 7. 174), small branch, 
twig. Cf. the use of the verb in 
Macbeth, iv. i. 28, "Slips of yew, 
slivered in the moon's eclipse". 
From A. S. sUfan, to cleave. 

sort (i. I. 109), either 'suit', 
'befit', or 'turn out', 'fall out'. 

station (iii. 4. 58), attitude, 
bearing. 



statist (v. 2. 33), statesman; 
used again in Cymbeline, ii. 4. 16. 

still (ii. 2. 42; iv. 7. 117), al- 
ways, constantly. 

stithy (iii. 2. 79), anvil, smithy. 

stop (iii. 2. 76, 376, 381), the 
mechanism for regulating the pas- 
sage of air in a wind-instrument. 

stoup (v. I. 68 ; V. 2. 278), a 
drinking vessel. 

stuck (iv. 7. 162), a thrust in 
fencing ; the Italian stoccado. 

supervise (v. 2'. 23), inspection, 
reading. 

suppliance (i. 3. 9), diversion, 
pastime, that which supplies or 
fills up a vacant moment. 

table (i. 5. 98; ii. 5. 107), tablet, 
or memorandum-book ; so table- 
book (ii. 2. 136). 

take (i. i. 163), enchant. Cf. 
Winters Tale, iv. 4. 118, "daffo- 
dils that . . . take the winds of 
March with beauty". 

tarre (ii. 2. 370), set on, origi- 
nally to incite dogs to fight. Cf. 
Troilus and Cressida, i. 3. 392, 
' ' Pride alone must tarre the mas- 
tiffs on", 

temper (v, 2. 339), mix. 

tend: (i) (iii. i. 170), have a 
tendency; (2) (i. 3. 83; iv. 3. 47; 
iii. 2. 216), attend. 

tender, noun (i. 3. 99, 103, 106), 
offer; vb. (i) (i. 3. 107; iv. 3. 43), 
treat tenderly, take care of; (2) 
(i. 3. 109), show. Cf. Winters 
Tale, iv. 4. 826, " I'll . . . tender 
your persons to his presence". 

tent (ii. 2. 626), search, prove, 
try ; so the noun in Troilus and 
Cressida, ii. 2. 16, and elsewhere. 

tetter (i. v. 71), a thickening of 
the skin in disease. 

thews (i. 3. 12), muscles, 
strength. 

tickle (ii. 2. 337), unstable, 
easily moved. 



218 



HAMLET. 



top, vb. (iv. 7. 89), surpass. 

toward (i. i. 71 ; v. 2. 376), at 
hand. 

toy: (i)(iv. 5. 18), trifle; (2) (i. 
3. 6; i. 4. 75), idle fancy. 

travel (ii. 2. 343), go on tour in 
the provinces ; used technically of 
theatrical companies. 

trick, noun (iv. 4. 61), plaything. 
Cf. Winter's Tale, ii. i. 51, "A 
very trick for them to play at will". 

trick, vb. (ii. 2. 479), adorn, pro- 
perly an heraldic term ; "a trick 
being a delineation of arms, in 
w^hich the colours are distinguished 
by their technical marks, w^ithout 
any colour being laid on" (Dyce). 

tropically (iii. 2. 247), meta- 
phorically, from Gr. t^o'to?, a figure 
of speech. 

truepenny (i. v. 150), true, 
honest fellovi^. 

truncheon (i. 2. 104), staff. 

tyrannically (ii. 2. 356), violent- 
ly, as the part of the tyrant was 
played in the mysteries. Cf. iii. 
2. 15, "It out-herods Herod", 
and note ad loc. 

unaneled (i. 5. jj), without the 
rite of extreme unction or anoint- 
ing, a sacrament in the Catholic 
Church. Cf. Sir T. More, " The 
extreme unction, or anelynge, and 
confirmacion, he sayed, be xyo sac- 
raments of the church". 

unbated (iv. 7. 39 ; v. 2. 328), 
unblunted, without a button (cf. 
foil); to bate is to 'abate, dimin- 
ish', and so to 'blunt'; cf. Love's 
Labour's Lost, i. i. 6, "bate his 
scythe's keen edge". 

unhouselled (i. 5. 77), without 
the sacrament ; housel is from 
A. S. ktisel, lit. sacrifice. 

union (v. 2. 283, 337), an espe- 
cially' fine pearl; probably from 
Lat. unus in the sense of ' unique '. 



unsifted (i. 3. 102), untried. 
use (i. 2. 134; iii. 4. 163, 168), 
habit, custom. 

vail (i. 2. 70), lower; cf. Afer- 
cha?it of Vejiice, i. i. 28, "vailing 
her high-top lower than her ribs". 

valanced (ii. 2. 442), fringed, 
lit. with drapery; metaphorically 
' with a beard ' . 

ventage (iii. 2. 373), a hole in a 
musical instrument for the passage 
of air. 

very: (i) (ii. 2. 49), veritable, 
real; (2) (iii. 4. 137; iv. 7. 78; v. 
I. 119), mere. 

virtue (iv. 5. 155; iv. 7. 145), 
power, efficacy. 

wake, vb. (i. 4. 8), revel by 
night; cf. Sonnet Ixi. , "For thee 
watch I while thou dost wake else- 
where". A wake is properly the 
Vigilia, or eve of the dedication of 
a church, during which watch was 
kept in it; then the annual feast 
of dedication. 

wassail (i. 4. 9), revelry; from 
A. S. waes hael, be of health, a 
formula used in drinking a toast. 

windlass (ii. i. 65), a winding, 
circuitous course ; so, a subtle 
stratagem ; cf Golding, Ovid, 
Met. bk. vii.— 

' ' like a wily fox he runs not forth 
directly out, 
Nor makes a windlasse over all 
the champion fields about"; 

and Mirror for Magistrates, 
"Which by slie drifts and wind- 
laces aloof, I They brought about". 

woundless (iv. i. 44), invulner- 
able. 

writ (ii. 2. 420), writing, espe- 
cially dramatic writing; cf note 
ad loc. and Titus Androfiicus, ii. . 
3. 264, ' ' This fatal writ | The 
complot of this timeless tragedy". 

yaw (v.2. 120), stagger, move un- 



GLOSSARY. 



219 



steadily ; used especially of ships. 
Massinger, Very Woman, iii. 5, 
has the substantive, ' ' O, the yaws 
that she will make ! Look to vour 



stern, dear mistress, and steer 
right ". From the Scand. gaga, to 
bend backwards, probably a re- 
duplicated form oigo. 



INDEX OF WORDS. 



(The references are to the Notes ad locc. Other words will be 
found in the Glossary. ) 



abridgement, ii. 2. 439. 
act, i. 2. 105. 
an end, i. 5. 19. 
any the most, i. 2. 99. 
assays of bias, ii. i. 65. 
assume, ii. 4. 160. 
attent, i. 2. 193. 

beautified, ii. 2. no. 
buz, buz, ii. 2. 412. 
by the card, v. i. 149. 

canonized, i. 4. 47. 
caviare, ii. 2. 457. 
conscience, iii. i. 83. 
cousin, i. 2. 117. 
crants, v. i. 255. 
cries on havoc, v. 2. 375. 
crowflowers, iv. 7. 170. 

Danskers, ii. i. 7. 
dear, i. 2. 182. 
delated, i. 2. 38. 
difference, iv. 5. 183. 
disappointed, i. 4. 77. 
discourse, i. 2. 150. 
dispatched, i. 4. 75. 
distilled, i. 2. 204. 

eale, i. 4. 36. 
eisel, v. i. 299. 

encompassment and drift, ii. i , 10. 
erring, i. i. 154. 
eternal, v. 2. 376. 
eternal blazon, i. 5. 21. 
even, v. i. 32. 
extravagant, i. i. 154. 

fast, i. 5. II. 

fetch of warrant, ii. i. 38. 



figure, ii. 2. 98. 
fine, v. I. 115. 
foil, v. 2. 266. 
fordoes, ii. i. 103. 
forgeries, ii. i. 20. 
for to, iii. I. 175. 

general, ii. 2. 457. 
groundlings, iii. 2. 12. 

handsaw, ii. 2. 397. 
Hebona, i. 5. 62. 
hobby-horse, iii. 2, 144. 

impart, i, 2. 112. 

incorrect, i. 2. 95. 

in little, ii. 2. 383. 

it, i. 2. 216. 

i' the sun, i. 2. 66; ii. 2. 185. 

jig, ii. 2. 522. 

John a dreams, ii. 2. 595. 

law of writ and the liberty, ii. 2. 

420. 
loggats, V. I. 100. 
long purples, iv. 7. 170. 

miching mallecho, iv. 2. 147. 
milch, ii. 2. 540. 
mistake, iv. 2. 262. 
modesty, ii. 2. 461. 
moiety competent, i. i. 90. 
moods, i. 2. 82. 
mortal coil, iii. i. 67. 
murdering piece, iv. 5. 95. 

nerve, i. 4. 83. 
nobility, i. 2. iio. 

obsequious, i. 2. 92. 



INDEX OF WORDS. 



221 



o'erteemed, ii. 2. 531. 

of general assault, li. i. 35. 

packing, iii. 4. 211. 
pajock, iii. 2. 295. 
pass of practice, iv. 7. 139. 
pitch, iii. I. 86. 
progress, iy. 3. 33. 
puppets, iii. 2. 257. 

recorder, iii. 2. 303. 
round, ii. 2. 139. 

sables, iii. 2. 138. 
secure, i. 5. 61. 
se offendendo, v. i. 9, 
shape, iv. 7. 151. 
swoopstake, iv. 5. 142. 

table book, ii. 2. 135. 
tables, i, 5, 107. 
tell, i. 2. 126. 



thieves of mercy, iv. 6. 21. 

tickle o' the sere, ii. 2. 337. 

too dear a halfpenny, ii. 2. 282. 

too too, i. 2. 129. 

toy, i. 3. 6. 

turn Turk, iii. 2. 287. 

unaneled, i. 5. 77. 
unapproved, i. i. 96. 
uncharge, iv. 7. 68. 
upon, i. I. 6. 
upspring, i. 4. 9. 
uses, i. 2. 134. 
usurp, i. I. 46. 

valanced, ii. 2. 442, 
virgin crants, v. I. 255. 

wheel, iv. 5. 172. 

who (for whojyi), i. 2. 190. 

yaw, V. 2. 120. 



GENERAL INDEX. 



actors' shares, iii. i. 290. 

"Adam's profession", v. 1/ 35. 

adjective as adverb, iii. i. 202; iii. 3. 116. 

"Aeneas' tale to Dido", ii. 2. 468. 

ballad of Jephthah's daughter, ii. 2, 426, 

biblical references, i. 3. 12; iv. 5. 216; v. 2. 231. 

"bonny Sweet Robin", iv. 5. 187. 

Breton (Nicholas) quoted, ii. 2. 457. 

Browne's explanation of apparitions, ii. 2. 627. 

Caesar, iii. 2. 108. 

"canon 'gainst self-slaughter", i. 2. 132. 

Capitol, iii. 2. 109. 

" card or calendar of gentry ", v. 2. 114. 

Centaur, iv. 7. 86. 

"chameleon's dish", iii. 2. 98. 

clown's song, v, I. 69. 

Coleridge quoted, p. 123; i. 5. 98; iii. I. 80, 

columbine, iv, 5. 180. 

"cursed Hebona", i. 5. 62. 

daisy, iv, 5. 184. 

Danegelt, iii. I. 178. 

"dear my lord", iii. 3. 35. 

Delius quoted, ii. 2. 170. 

"dews of blood", i. i. 117. 

double comparative, ii. i. II; iii. 2. 316; iii. 4. 167; v. 2. 1 19. 

double negative, i. 2. 158; iii. I. 171. 

Douce quoted, ii. 2. 448. 

drunkenness of Danes and Englishmen, i. 4. 15. 

Dryden quoted, ii. 2. 540. 

dumbshow, iii. 2. 145. 

ellipse, i. I. 16. 

ethic dative, ii. 2. 454. 

"every dog has his day", v. I. 315. 

' ' fat and scant of breath ", v. 2, 298. 

"fat weed ", i. 5. 32. 

fennel, iv. 5. 180. 

French sportsmen, ii. 2. 450. 

Hamlet's age, v. i. 177. 

Hamlet's love-letter, ii. 2. 109. 

Hecate, iii. 2. 269. 



GENERAL INDEX. 223 

Hercules, ii. 2. 378. 

Herod, iii. 2. 16. 

"hide fox and all after", iv. 2. 32. 

" humorous man ", ii. 2. 335. 

"humours", iii. 2. 74. 

" Hyrcanian beast ", ii. 2. 472. 

Hyperion, i. 2. 140. 

influence of stars, i. i. 162; ii. 2. 141. 

intransitive verb used transitively, i. I. 72. 

Jephthah, ii. 2. 422. 

Johnson quoted, iii. 2. 74. 

Jove, iii. 2. 294. 

Lamond, iv. 7. 93. 

legal metaphor, i. 2. 60. 

legend of baker's daughter becoming an owl, iv. 5. 41. 

Lethe, i. 5. 33. 

Lowell quoted, iv. 7. 168. 

Marshall quoted, iii. 3. 93. 

moon's influence on tides, i. i. 119. 

negative adjectives, i. 2. 97 ; i. 5. 77. 

Nemean lion, i. 4. 83. 

Niobe, i. 2. 149. 

Olympus, V. i. 276. 

Ophelia's songs, iv. 5. 23. 

Ossa, V. i. 306. 

oxymoron, i. 2. II. 

pansies, iv. 5. 176. 

pelican, iv. 5. 146. 

Pelion, V. i. 276. 

petrifying springs, iv. 7. 20, 

Plautus, ii. 2. 420. 

"primal eldest curse", iii. 3. 37. 

prodigies in Rome, i. i. 114. 

" provincial roses ", iii. 2. 288. 

Ptolemaic astronomy, iv. 7. 15. 

reduplication, i. 2. 129; iii. 3. 9. 

repetition of subject, i. 2. 22, 114, 

rosemary, iv. 5. 175. 

rue, iv. 5. 181. 

S. Patrick, i. 5. 136. 

Schlegel quoted, ii. 2. 468. 

Seneca, ii. 2. 419. 

"sledded pole-axe", i. i. 62. 

"springes to catch woodcocks", i. 3. II5. 

Steevens quoted, ii. 2. 113. 

Switzers, iv. 5. 97. 

"take arms against a sea", iii. i. 57. 

Termagant, iii. 2. 15. 



224 HAMLET. 

textual notes, i. i. 13, 44, 63, 65, 96, 98, 117, 161, 163, 167; i. 2. 
38, 82, 112, 129, 150, 175, 198, 200, 204, 222, 248; i. 3. 21, 
26, 57, 65, 74, 76, 109, 130; i. 4. I, 36, 48, 49; i. 5. II, 33, 
56, 167; ii. I. 39; ii. 2. 6, 12, 52, 73, 160, 182, 214, 221, 337, 
397, 438, 442, 517, 525, 580; iii. I. 13, 67, 86, 148; iii. 2. 50, 
249, 262, 277; iii. 3. 7; iii. 4. 4, 162, 169, 182; iv. i. 40; 
iv. 3. 66, 70; iv. 4. 3; iv. 5. 38, 119, 142, 153, 213; iv. 6. 2; 
• iv. 7. 21, 22, 59, 82, 178, 192; V. I. 38, 67, 225, 269, 299, 
307; V. 2. 9, 42, 78, 120, 196, 200, 234, 283. 

transposition of adjectives, i. 2. 18. 

Tschischwitz quoted, i. 5. 32. 

valentines, iv. 5. 48, 

"vice of kings", iii. 4. 98. 

violets, V. I. 263. 

Wittenberg, i. 2. 113. 

Worms, iv. 3. 21. 

Yaughan, v. I. 68. • 

Yorick, v. I. 198. 



peacidified using the Bookkeeper process 
Neutralizing agent: IVIagnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: Feb. 2009 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN COLLECTIONS PRESERVATION 

111 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township, PA 16066 
(724) 779-2111 



